LIBRARY OF THE
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN
977o3
1922
v .5
cop. 5
111. Hist. Survey
Illinois Centennial $irf)ltcationg
PUBLISHED BY AUTHORITY
OF THE
ILLINOIS CENTENNIAL COMMISSION
THE CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF ILLINOIS
CLARENCE WALWORTH ALVORD
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
VOLUME V
ILLINOIS CENTENNIAL COMMISSION
OTTO LEOPOLD SCHMIDT, Chairman
JESSIE PALMER WEBER, Secretary
EDWARD BOWE EVARTS BOUTELL GREENE
JOHN JOSEPH BROWN GEORGE PASFIELD, JR.
JOHN W. BUNN WILLIAM NELSON PELOUZE
WILLIAM BUTTERWORTH ANDREW JACKSON POORMAN, JR.
LEONARD ALLAN COLP THOMAS F. SCULLY
ROYAL WESLEY ENNIS FREDERIC SIEDENBURG
EDMUND JANES JAMES
COMMITTEE ON CENTENNIAL PUBLICATIONS
EVARTS BOUTELL GREENE, Chairman
ROYAL WESLEY ENNIS OTTO LEOPOLD SCHMIDT
EDMUND JANES JAMES FREDERIC SIEDENBURG
.
51
THE CENTENNIAL HISTORY OF ILLINOIS
VOLUME FIVE
THE MODERN
COMMONWEALTH
1893-1918
BY
ERNEST LUDLOW BOGART
AND
JOHN MABRY MATHEWS
CHICAGO
A. C. McCLURG & CO.
1922
COPYRIGHT, 1920
BY THE
ILLINOIS CENTENNIAL COMMISSION
77. 3
/V, *
TABLE OF CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. POPULATION ....... : ...... i
II. THE GROWTH OF EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS . 30
III. AGRICULTURAL CHANGES .......... 56
IV. PRODUCTS OF THE FARM .......... 71
V. MANUFACTURES ............. 91
VI. TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION ........ 113
VII. WATER TRANSPORTATION AND ROADS ..... 135
VIII. LABOR ORGANIZATION AND LEGISLATION .... 156
IX. CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT AND REVISION . . 190
X. THE GOVERNOR ............. 209
XL STATE OFFICERS, BOARDS, AND COMMISSIONS . . 237
XII. ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES ......... 259
XIII. CIVIL SERVICE AND CIVIL SERVICE REFORM . . . . 271
XIV. THE STATE LEGISLATURE ......... 288
XV. THE STATE JUDICIARY .......... 320
XVI. SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, AND ELECTIONS ..... 349
XVII. THE ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW ...... 381
XVIII. THE PANIC OF 1893 AND THE BANKS ..... 394
XIX. STATE FINANCES ............ 421
XX. STATE TAXATION ............ 433
XXI. ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR ....... 452
APPENDIX .............. 493
BIBLIOGRAPHY ............. 517
INDEX . . . ............. 531
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
MICHIGAN AVENUE Frontispiece
POPULATION OF ILLINOIS IN 1910 2
WILLIAM RAINEY HARPER 30
DECLINE IN RURAL POPULATION, 1900-1910 56
PERCENTAGE OF FARMS OPERATED BY TENANTS, 1910 . . . 64
MILES OF RAILROAD LINES, 1840-1914 120
VOTE FOR GOVERNOR, NOVEMBER 5, 1912 210
VOTE FOR ATTORNEY-GENERAL, NOVEMBERS, 1908 240
VOTE FOR REPRESENTATIVES IN THE FORTY-SIXTH GENERAL
ASSEMBLY, NOVEMBER 3, 1908 288
INCREASE OF STATE RECEIPTS, EXPENDITURES, AND TAXES, 1892-
1916 422
PREFACE
TO WRITE the history of recent events is at no time an
easy task. But when this history concerns the develop-
ment of a growing, dynamic body like the people of Illinois, the
attempt to portray their manifold activities and constant re-
adjustments becomes doubly difficult. This volume seeks to
trace the main lines of economic, political, and social develop-
ment during the past quarter century, and to indicate the meas-
ure of progress which the people of this state have achieved in
these departments of human endeavor. After all is said it is a
record of which any state might well be proud.
Progress has been particularly marked in all lines of eco-
nomic activity. The growth of population and of wealth, the
steadily augmenting output of farm and factory and mine, the
expansion of railway and other transportation facilities, and
the improvements in agriculture, manufactures, banking, and
commerce, all bear witness to the' energy and successful achieve-
ments of the people. But the story is by no means confined to
material improvement. With the growth in wealth has come
an increasing application of that wealth and the interests of the
people to the advancement of culture, of art, and of learning.
And with the growth in leisure has come better understanding
of political problems and a determination to solve them.
. During the last quarter of a century political development
in the direction of better and more efficient government has been
slow but steady. This growth has been especially noticeable in
connection with the introduction of the merit system of appoint-
ment to the civil service and the reorganization of the principal
administrative services on a more integrated and systematic
basis. The increasing power of the governor over both legisla-
tion and administration is also noteworthy. Political progress
THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
in a democracy rests at bottom upon the education and prac-
tical experience of the mass of the voters in governmental
affairs. The increasing interest and participation of the peo-
ple in political activities is, therefore, a healthy sign and indi-
cates that the political salvation of the state is, in spite of ups
and downs, being worked out.
The author of the chapters on economic development wishes
to make acknowledgment for valuable assistance rendered him
in the preparation of this volume. Preliminary studies were
made on different topics by the following persons working as
research assistants for the Illinois Historical Survey or for the
Centennial Commission : agriculture, George H. Newlove ;
manufactures, Yetta Scheftel; trade, and road and water trans-
portation, Walter Prichard; railroad transportation, Clare E.
Griffin; labor organization, E. B. Mittelman.
The author of the chapters on government and politics
desires to acknowledge his indebtedness for valuable sugges-
tions and criticisms to Mr. W. F. Dodd, secretary of the Legis-
lative Reference Bureau, who has read the entire manuscript of
those chapters. The authors alone, however, are responsible
for the errors and shortcomings of the work.
No volume on modern Illinois would seem complete with-
out mention of the state's part in the World War. By special
arrangement, therefore, Professor Arthur C. Cole has sup-
plied chapter twenty-one, which gives a brief survey of that
subject. Likewise by special arrangement, Mr. Henry B.
Fuller has contributed a supplementary chapter on arts and
letters, chapter two.
ERNEST L. BOGART,
JOHN M. MATHEWS.
URBANA, March 20, igi8.
THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
1893-1918
I. POPULATION
THE rapid increase in the population which had charac-
terized the early days of pioneering and land speculation
and even the later period of settlement and development had
carried Illinois to high rank among the states. By 1860 it
held fourth place and a generation later attained third place,
a rank which it has since held, being surpassed at present in
the size of its population only by New York and Pennsylvania.
Proud of its rapid growth, which it accepted as a sign of
virility, it boasted with all the hardihood of youth of its accu-
mulating numbers and sought by every legitimate method to
attract and hold a still larger population. And to the Illinois
of 1870, with its teeming untouched resources, its untenanted
farms, and the wonderful industrial opportunities which men
of vision saw undeveloped on every hand, a larger population
was essential. For the fullest realization of its powers, the utili-
zation of its resources, and the development of the highest
type of civilization, a people must secure physical and mental
contact; and for this purpose a fairly dense population is neces-
sary. For these reasons the rate of increase of the population
was a question of supreme importance in the growth of the
state.
Illinois has always been an hospitable state and has wel-
comed the newcomers with open arms. The measure of its
welcome has been the political rights and the economic oppor-
tunities which it has granted, and in both these respects it
responded lavishly in 1870. Liberal franchise laws soon put
the stranger upon a political equality with the older citizens.
The period since the Civil War has been marked primarily
by the exploitation of the natural and agricultural resources
2 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of the country, their utilization in expanding manufactures,
and the improvement and extension of transportation facilities.
A tremendous demand was thus created for labor and in this
need Illinois kept pace with the other states. Indeed its neces-
sities were greater than those of the older states to the east, as
they were more urgent than those of the less richly endowed
states to the west or south. The response to its call was prompt
and unceasing.
The year 1870 marks the dividing line between a period
of rapid growth in the population of the state and one of much
slower growth. During the fifty years from 1810 to 1860 the
population of Illinois had increased very markedly, the smallest
rate of increase for any decade being seventy-eight and eight-
tenths per cent between 1840 and 1850, and in every instance
showing a growth many times as rapid as that of the country
as a whole. But by 1870 the rush of settlement had passed
this state and the rate of growth slowed down decidedly. It
is characteristic of older settled communities that after the
early settlement and the first flush of immigration there should
be a steady decline in the rate of increase. Illinois was no
exception during the fifty years ending in 1910, and in the last
decade even reached the low rate of sixteen and nine-tenths per
cent increase. Indeed in every decade since 1870 the rate of
increase has fallen below that of the nation as a whole except
for the period 18901900 the decade of the World's Colum-
bian exposition. On the other hand, while the rate of increase
has been falling off, the absolute number of persons added to
the population has remained fairly constant and has even grown
slightly. This is perhaps a fairer test of growth than the rate,
for as the total population increases the latter would normally
decline. It is certain that Illinois is by no means overcrowded
and that the population of the state may be expected to continue
to grow, though at an ever-declining rate, in the future as in
the past.
The average density of population in Illinois in 1910 was
100.6 persons to the square mile ; this was an increase from 45.4
Population of Illinois,
1910. Number of
Inhabitants per
45 to 90
90 and over
POPULATION
in 1870. How dense this is can best be seen by a comparison
with some of the eastern states. Such a comparison will dissi-
pate any doubt as to the future growth of the state, or the possi-
bility of its ability to support a larger population. If Illinois
POPULATION OF ILLINOIS AND OF THE UNITED STATES, 1800-1910
DATE
Population of
United States
Population of
Illinois
Rank of
Illinois
in union
Rate of increase for decade
United States
Illinois
1800
1810 ....
5,308,483
7,239,88i
9,638,453
12,866,020
17,069,453
23,191,876
31,443,321
38,558,371
50,155,783
62,947,714
75,994,575
91,972,266
12,282
55,2ii
157,445
476,183
851,470
i,7">95i
2,539,891
3,077,871
3,826,352
4,821,550
5,638,591
24
24
20
H
II
4
4
4
3
3
3
35-i
36.4
33.1
33-5
32.7
35-9
35-6
26.6
30.1
25-5
20.7
2I.O
349-5
185.2
202.4
78.8
IOI.I
48.4
21.2
24.3
26.O
16.9
lg2O
1830
184.0. .
1 8 50
ig6o
1870
1880 ....
1890
IQOO. .
IOIO. .
had as many persons to the square mile as Rhode Island, which
was in 1910 the most densely settled state in the union, its popu-
lation would amount to 28,500,000 instead of 5,600,000; or if
the people of Illinois were no more numerous than those of
Massachusetts, the second state in point of density, they would
number 23,500,000; while if Illinois were to become an indus-
trial state with a population as dense as that of Belgium, the
most densely settled state in Europe, it would have 56,800,000
persons within its limits. It is evident that there is still room
for expansion.
The population of the state has been growing, but different
sections of the state have shared very unequally in this develop-
ment. The most striking shift that has come about in the dis-
tribution of the population during the last forty years has been
the growth of the urban centers, which have absorbed the major
portion of the newcomers, and in some counties even caused a
decrease in the rural population.
THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
While the movement from country to city is national in its
scope it has been proceeding much more rapidly in Illinois, espe-
cially in recent years, than in the union as a whole. In 1870
Illinois, still preponderantly an agricultural state, was more
rural than the average. Only 17.2 per cent of the population
lived in cities of 8,000 inhabitants or over as against 20.9 for
the United States. By 1880 the two percentages were about
the same; in Illinois about three-tenths of the population lived
in cities. But in the three decades ending in 1890, 1900, and
1910 the urbanization of the state has gone on much more rap-
idly than that of the whole country, so that by the last date
almost sixty-two per cent of the population were living in towns
or cities in Illinois, as against forty-six per cent in the United
States. Illinois is therefore approaching the status of the states
in the east, as its population becomes steadily more urban. The
following table shows the distribution of the urban population
in somewhat greater detail:
DISTRIBUTION OF URBAN POPULATION, BY SIZE OF CITY, 1870-1910*
YEAR
State
Chicago
Cities having population
25,000-100,000
Population
Per cent
population
No.
Total popu-
lation
Per cent
population
1870. .
2,539,891
3,077,871
3,826,352
4,821,550
5,638,591
298,977
503,185
1,099,850
1,698,575
2,185,283
n.6
16.3
28.7
35-2
38.8
2
2
6
II
56,527
72,518
216,570
434,395
1.8
i-9
4-5
7-7
1880
1890
IOOO. .
I QIO. .
YEAR
No.
Towns of 2,500 to 25,000
Rural districts
Population
Per cent
population
Population
Per cent
population
1870
46
66
75
107
132
297,065
257,056
537,804
701,223
857,251
II-7
12.3
14.1
14.5
15-3
1,943,849
2,137,367
2,116,180
2,205,182
2,161,662
76.6
69.4
55-3
45-7
38.3
1880
1800. .
IQIO .
IOOO. . .
1 Thirteenth Census of the United States, i : 68.
POPULATION 5
A more careful examination of the statistics, however,
shows that the apparent urbanization of the population pro-
ceeds rather from the phenomenal growth of Chicago than
from a state wide movement from the farms to the cities in
general. It will be noticed that the population of Chicago grew
by leaps and bounds, the proportion of persons living in the
smaller cities of 25,000 to 100,000 increased but slightly, and
the proportion in those having between 2,500 and 25,000 re-
mained practically stationary. The only deduction possible is
that the depopulation of the rural districts has been coincident
with the growth of the city of Chicago.
This city has not only steadily grown in relation to the state
as a whole, with one-tenth of the population in 1870 and almost
four-tenths in 1910, but has also absorbed most of the rural
population which during this period has been deserting the
farms. In the latter year Chicago had actually more inhabi-
tants than all the rural districts of the state put together. If
Chicago be excluded entirely from consideration, however, it is
clear that no such serious change has occurred in the distribu-
tion of the population of the state outside this city, though even
in this case there is evident an appreciable movement from rural
to urban, or to semiurban, districts, especially the latter.
As a result of the gains of the cities and towns of the state,
aside from the growth of Chicago, the rural population was
steadily declining, from 87 per cent of the non-Chicago total in
1870 to 62 per cent in 1910. While the small towns of under
25,000 inhabitants gained most of this rural loss down to 1890,
the last two censuses show a greater gain for the medium sized
cities. Or perhaps it would be more correct to say that the
gains of the smaller towns have been so great that they have
risen in time to the dignity of cities of twenty-five to one hun-
dred thousand. In 1870 there was no city in the state in this
group, but by 1910 the number had grown to eleven. At the
same time the number of smaller towns had increased from 46
in 1870 to 132 in 1910.
In order to estimate the tendency of the population move-
6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ment now going on in the state it is not sufficient, however, to
study the distribution between city and country at different
periods; the rate of growth of the various divisions from one
census period to another must also be noted. The rate of in-
crease of the population of the state as a whole has shown a
steady decline, as pointed out above. Chicago's development
has been subject to wild fluctuations, increasing by 174 per cent
in the decade 1 860-1 870, by only 68 percent in the next decade,
spurting forward again between 1880 and 1890, since which
time the rate of growth has steadily fallen off. The growth of
the smaller cities of the state has shown similar variations, due
in part to the growth of smaller towns from one decade to an-
other and their inclusion in the list of cities in the later census
enumerations. Next to the growth of Chicago, however, the
most significant thing is the decline in the population of the
rural districts, which in 1890 and again in 1910 shows a de-
crease instead of an increase.
A closer study of the rate of growth of the twelve cities in
the state with a population in 1910 of over 25,000 reveals some
interesting changes. In the decade 18601870 the greatest
growth was made by Danville (191.1 per cent), though Chicago
was a close second (173.6). In the decade 1870 1880 Chicago
led with 68.3 per cent, Danville (62.8), East St. Louis (62.7),
Elgin (61.5), and Joliet ( 60.5 ) following close behind. There
was a decided falling off in the rate of growth of the population
of the state as a whole during this decade, due probably to the
exaggerations of the census of 1870; and this was evidenced in
the slowing down of the rate of increase of the urban popula-
tion. During the decade 18801890 Chicago was again far in
the lead with a gain of 1 18.6 per cent, second place being taken
by Elgin with 102.8. The rate of growth of Chicago now de-
clined, though the absolute increase for the next decade 1890-
1900, was even greater than the previous one, and the lead was
taken by East St. Louis (95.5 per cent), with Chicago second
(54.4). For the last decade 19001910, East St. Louis again
showed the greatest growth (97.4 per cent), while Danville
POPULATION 7
took second place (70.4), Chicago meanwhile sinking to sixth
place. The smallest increase for this decade was shown by
Quincy, which grew only 0.9 per cent.
It would seem from these figures of the rate of growth of
the different cities that there might be some hope in the future
of a more equal distribution of the urban population among
the twelve cities with a population of over 25,000, but the per-
centages of rate of increase are somewhat misleading. The
larger the population of Chicago the smaller the rate of in-
crease will become, even though an equal number of inhabitants
be added each year. If the absolute growth of the population
be taken as a basis of comparison, there is not shown any likeli-
hood that the other cities of the state will close the gap between
themselves and Chicago. For instance, in the decade 1900
1910 the population of Chicago increased 486,708, that of the
other eleven cities together increased only 110,851 and all the
rest of the state 2 19,482.
One peculiarity about the distribution of the population in
Illinois between city and country, which is brought out clearly
by a study of these figures, is the growing importance of Chi-
cago in the development and life of the state, until today it
occupies a dominating position. There is a wide gap between
Chicago and East St. Louis with its 75,000 inhabitants, the sec-
ond city in the state as regards size. Only four cities outside of
Chicago have as many as 50,000 inhabitants, and only eleven
have 25,000 or more. The population of the twelve leading
cities in the state was estimated as follows in 1916: Chicago,
2,497,722 ; East St. Louis, 74,708 ; Peoria, 71,458 ; Springfield,
61,120; Rockford, 55,185; Decatur, 39,631; Joliet, 38,010;
Quincy, 36,798; Aurora, 34,204; Danville, 32,261; Elgin,
28,203; Bloomington, 27,258. 2
The rise of Chicago from a trading station of less than a
dozen houses in 1818 and its first incorporation as a city in
1837 to that of its present dominating position as the leading
city of the Mississippi valley, the second in size in the United
2 Estimates of Population of the United States, 20.
8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
States and the fourth in the world, is one of the marvels of the
nineteenth century. And yet this was only the logical outcome
of the economic and physical factors which made it inevitable
that a great city should develop on the southern shores of Lake
Michigan. The cause of the growth of Chicago was at first its
commerce, due to its advantageous situation for lake and river
trade. With the advent of railroads, the supremacy of the city
as the chief commercial center of the west was only more firmly
established. She became the gateway of the northwest and the
terminus of innumerable lines radiating in every direction. To
the commercial importance of Chicago the agricultural expan-
sion of the state and of the whole western country contributed
directly.
More recently, within the lifetime of the present genera-
tion, a still firmer and more enduring basis has been given to the
growth and future greatness of Chicago by the development of
manufactures. As an industrial city her growth dates from the
eighties. Chicago is greatly favored by the possession of prac-
tically all the requisites for supremacy in manufacturing: raw
materials, especially those derived from field and forest and
mine, within the boundaries of Illinois or those of neighboring
states, cheap power obtained from the low-grade coal of south-
ern Illinois and Indiana, a magnificent system of transportation
by water and rail which has given it the cheapest rates in the
world, and finally an abundant and high-grade supply of labor.
By this last is meant not alone the manual workers who have
contributed their mechanical skill or muscular strength to the
upbuilding of the city, but even more the men of capacity and
vision who foresaw the possibilities of the future and devoted
their energies and ability to the realization of their dreams.
The modern city of Chicago dates from 1871 when the
great fire swept away many of the existing structures. Half a
century, therefore, has seen the construction of the material
monuments of the city of today the massive business build-
ings and the countless homes of the people, the schools and
other public institutions, the water, sewer, and lighting systems,
POPULATION 9
the railways, the streets, and public parks. Marvelous as this
has been, it is not more striking than the spirit of the people
which has made it possible. Energetic, daring, undismayed,
charged with hope and high faith in the future, withal at times
a little brusque and with a breeziness born of the lake near
which they dwell, the people of Chicago have achieved much
and won for themselves the admiration and wonder of the rest
of the world. The statistics of population record the growth of
the physical city, but the human qualities which have made Chi-
cago great are not reducible to measurement. 8
Not only Chicago but the state of Illinois has become in-
creasingly industrial, and as a result the population has tended
to become more urban. Indeed one of the remarkable features
about the development of Illinois is the fact that while it holds
first place in the union as an agricultural state, it ranks second
in the value of the products of the mines, and third in those of
manufactures. If Illinois be compared with other states in the
union as regards the urbanization of the population, that is
the proportion living in cities of 25,000 or over, it is found to
rank sixteenth in this respect in 1880, eleventh in 1890, and
seventh in both 1900 and 1910. In the last year, it was out-
ranked by Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New
York, and New Jersey, and equalled by California. It is evi-
dent from this grouping that from 1900 on, Illinois must be
classed among the industrial states with a large urban popula-
tion engaged in industrial pursuits.
More important for the sake of throwing light upon the
causes of the growth and distribution of the population even
than the study of the urban development is the investigation of
the growth of the separate counties. If a list were made of the
ten most populous counties for each of the five census periods
from 1870 to 1910, seven would be found to occur in every
list; 4 two of those in the original list of 1870 (Adams and Mc-
3 The population of Chicago grew from 298,977 in 1870 to 503,185 in 1880,
1,099,850 in 1890, 1,698,575 in 1900, 2,185,283 in 1910, and 2,393,325 in 1917. This
is a record equaled by no other city.
4 These are Cook, St. Clair, Peoria, Kane, Sangamon, La Salle, and Will.
Madison occurs in every list except that for 1900.
io THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Lean) drop out in 1910, to have their places taken by two
others (Vermilion and Rock Island) which had sprung into im-
portance in the interval. It is evident that most of these coun-
ties are among the most densely settled because in them are to
be found the larger cities in the state. Their growth must be
attributed to the growth of the urban population within their
boundaries rather than to a general thickening of the popula-
tion over their entire area. Thus, the city of Chicago is to be
found in Cook county, La Salle in La Salle, Quincy in Adams,
Bloomington in McLean, East St. Louis in St. Clair, Peoria in
Peoria, Springfield in Sangamon, Alton in Madison, Joliet in
Will, Danville in Vermilion, Rock Island in Rock Island, and
Aurora and Elgin in Kane. Indeed those counties which show
the largest population have the largest cities, and the one,
namely Kane, which has shown the most rapid rise, has two
cities within its limits.
Of those counties which showed the greatest increase
for the last two decades, 18901910, at least six owe their rapid
growth to the exploitation of the coal underlying their surface,
while the other three have built up manufacturing industries
based upon the utilization of this coal and the cheap iron ores
brought down from the Minnesota mines. On the other hand,
the counties which have shown an actual decline in their popula-
tion are predominantly agricultural and have no industrial basis.
In the decade 18601870, only one county in the state
Kendall sustained a net loss in its population, but in the next
decennial period the movement from the country to the city or
from the state altogether began to show itself more strongly.
Nine counties showed a decline in their population in the decade
18701880, and twenty-eight in the following ten-year period.
During the decade 18901900 there was a tremendous increase
of the population of the state by almost a million souls, and
only six counties showed a falling off. Either this increase offset
the rural depopulation which had been going on or the move-
ment toward the cities slowed up, owing to industrial depres-
sion. But the lull was only temporary, for during the next dec-
POPULATION ii
ade the decline took on new vigor and in the period 1900-1910
some fifty counties or almost half of all those in the state
1 02 lost in population. 5 At the same time that the state was
expanding and developing in numbers there was going on within
the boundaries of the state a most interesting and significant
shift of the population from one set of counties namely the
agricultural to another set of counties the industrial and
mining. There was also a large number of other counties
whose population was practically stationary, but which another
decade will probably see join the class of those counties with a
declining population.
Perhaps it is too much to say that there has been a shift
from one set of counties to another. All that is known con-
fidently is that certain counties have lost and others have gained.
The persons who have left the counties with declining popula-
tions may have died or they may have left the state and moved
farther west during this period. And on the other hand, the
additions to the population in the growing counties may have
resulted largely from immigration. Probably both of these
movements have taken place, as may be seen by the statistics of
interstate migration and by those showing the composition of
the population according to nativity.
A glance at a map of the state in connection with a list of the
counties in which the population has decreased in any one of the
past four decades shows in which sections the movement was
strongest. During the decade 18701880, the loss was prac-
tically confined to a few counties in the middle western section.
Between 1880 and 1890 there was a movement away from the
5 The following is the list of counties which showed a loss in their population
between 1900 and 1910, the accompanying figure being the percentage of loss:
Adams (3.7), Boone (2), Brown (10), Calhoun (3.4), Carroll (4.9), Clark (2.1),
Clay (4.6), Cumberland (11.4), DeWitt (0.3), Edgar (3.3), Edwards (2.9), Ef-
fingham (2), Ford (6.9), Gallatin (7.6), Greene (4.4), Hamilton (9.8), Hancock
(4.9), Hardin (5.8), Henderson (10.3), Iroquois (6.5), Jasper (9.9), Jersey (4.5).
Jo Daviess (7.6), Johnson (8.5), Kendall (6), Lee (7.2), Livingston (3.7), Mc-
Donough (5.4), Marshall (4.2), Mason (0.7), Menard (10.7), Mercer (5.8),
Monroe (2.4), Morgan (1.7), Moultrie (3.9), Ogle (4.3), Piatt (7.5), Pike (94),
Pope (17.4), Richland (2.6), Schuyler (7.9), Scott (3. 7), Shelby (1.3), Stark (0.9),
Union (3.3), Washington (3. 9), Wayne (7), White (9.2), Whiteside (0.6), Wood
ford (6).
12 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
counties all along the western border. In fact only five counties
touching the Mississippi have not shown a loss at some time in
the last forty years. There was little change between 1890 and
1900, but during the decade 19001910 most of the counties
already listed showed additional losses, and they were joined
by a number of new ones, especially in the southern and south-
eastern parts of the state.
In order to understand more clearly the causes of the de-
cline in the population of practically half the counties in the
state between 1900 and 1910 it is necessary to differentiate the
rural population somewhat more carefully. This may be
divided into those living in incorporated places of less than
2,500 inhabitants and those living on farms or in unincorpo-
rated places ; the latter may be called the farm population and
the former the village population. Distinguishing these two
groups it is found that the small increase of the rural popula-
tion of three-tenths per cent for the decade was due to the posi-
tive decline of the farm population by over seven per cent, for
the village population increased eleven and one-tenth per cent.
It is evident therefore that any inquiry into the causes of the
loss of population in the rural districts of Illinois resolves itself
into an inquiry as to the reasons for the decline of the farm
population.
In the older sections of the country the obvious explanation
would be the abandonment of the farms, but the addition during
the decade of 349,104 acres to the improved farm area of the
state makes it necessary to seek a different answer for Illinois.
Another explanation of the movement from the farm to the
city is the smaller size of families and the barrenness of rural
social life. But the former would be difficult to establish statis-
tically, and the latter is decidedly less true with each passing
year. The introduction of rural free delivery, of the telephone,
of automobiles and interurbans, has tended to bring the city
nearer the farm.
A more correct explanation undoubtedly is that with the in-
creased use of farm machinery less labor is needed on the farm
POPULATION 13
and the labor thus set free naturally gravitates to the cities and
towns where it is absorbed by the expanding manufactures. 6
That this is true of Illinois is evidenced by the fact that during
the decade 19001910 the value of farm implements and ma-
chinery on the farms of the state increased from $44,977,310
to $73,724,074 or 63.9 per cent, which was double the rate of
increase for the previous decade. At the same time the number
of separate farms in the state declined five per cent, from 264,-
151 to 250,853. This was due to the fact that with the aid of
improved machinery a man could manage a bigger farm unit
than formerly. Between 1900 and 1910 the average size of
the farms in Illinois grew from 124.2 acres to 129.1 acres. The
number of horses and of gasoline engines on farms has also
shown a large increase. In other words human labor has been
supplanted by animal and other power, which, applied to im-
proved farm machinery, has greatly increased the efficiency of
the individual farmer and enabled him to work a larger farm,
increase his output, and at the same time dispense with part of
the labor force previously needed. If this explanation is cor-
rect, the movement of the population from the farms must be
regarded as an economic gain.
If the United States is the melting pot of the nationalities
of the world, Illinois certainly does its share in the fusing proc-
ess. Illinois has always been a favorite resort of immigrants.
Since 1870 it has ranked first in respect to the absolute number
of foreign born in the north central division, though Minnesota;
Wisconsin, and North Dakota have a larger proportion of for-
eign born. In the United States as a whole Illinois has been
exceeded since 1870 only by New York and Pennsylvania in
the total number of foreign born within the state. That they
have not constituted a larger percentage in the population of
the state is due to the equally rapid increase of the native popu-
.lation, which has kept the proportion very steady.
The proportion of the foreign born element in the popula-
6 Bogart, " Farm Ownership in the United States," Journal of Political
Economy, id: 203.
i 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tion has remained fairly steady for the past forty years, at about
twenty per cent of the total. There are seventeen other states
which have a larger proportion of foreign born, and twenty-six
which have a larger percentage of Negroes. But the problem
of assimilating these alien elements is not measured merely by
the number of the foreign born, for it usually takes more than
one generation to fuse them thoroughly into the body of Amer-
ican citizens. If therefore to those of foreign birth there be
added those persons, one or both of whose parents has been of
foreign birth, and whose home environment has therefore had a
considerable foreign flavor,, a truer index of the problem of
assimilation laid upon the people of Illinois will be given.
Throughout all five decades the proportion of this alien element
has been greater in Illinois than in the union as a whole.
In 1870 the two groups of foreign born and native born
with foreign or mixed parentage made up 59 per cent of the
total population in Illinois as compared with 55 per cent for the
whole country; in 1880 no comparison is possible as these sta-
tistics were not compiled by the census of that year ; in 1 890 the
figures were respectively 50 for Illinois and 45 for the United
States; in 1900 they were 53 and 46 per cent, and in 1910, 54
and 46 per cent. The proportion of alien elements was much
higher in 1 870 than in any subsequent period, as during the next
two decades there was a considerable movement of the native
born population into Illinois from states farther to the east. It
reached the lowest point in 1890 and since that time has gradu-
ally increased again, though in 1910 it had not yet reached the
proportion of 1870.
The problem here presented is too important to dismiss
with a bare record of the statistics involved. Its seriousness
for the economic, social, and political life of Illinois depends
upon several factors which cannot be given in any statistical
presentation. Much depends upon the nationality of the immi-
grants. The English and Irish, the Germans and Swedes of the
past generation were much more easily assimilated with the
native population than are the recent Latin and Slavic elements.
POPULATION 15
The Intelligence, age, training, plasticity, and other characteris-
tics of individuals must also be taken into account. Some come
with the intention of becoming permanent citizens; others are
simply sojourners and are possibly hostile to our institutions.
The " alienage," so to speak, of different groups and of indi-
viduals within each group will therefore be very different. The
continuance of the strength of the foreign influence which sur-
rounds the immigrant depends largely upon the environment in
which he is placed in his new home. Where he settles among
members of the same nationality, tlje foreign language, customs,
and habits of thought are apt to be perpetuated and the Amer-
icanization of the immigrant becomes more difficult. It is this
fact more than any other that has created such serious problems
in cities like Chicago, Joliet, Rockford, and other rapidly grow-
ing industrial towns.
There are no statistics of immigration into Illinois, so that
the table of foreign born in Illinois merely shows the number
of each nationality living in the state at the specified period.
Unless death or emigration removed those who were in the
state in 1870, they would be added to the newcomers between
1870 and 1880 and so on, so^ that normally each successive
census enumeration would show a larger number until the
earliest immigrants began to die off. This process is beginning
to show itself in the case of those nationalities which were al-
ready settled in the state in large numbers by 1870. Now,
almost fifty years later, the earlier settlers are disappearing and
the later immigrants are not coming in fast enough to maintain
the group. Thus, the crest of the wave for British, Irish, Ger-
mans, and French was reached in 1890, since which date their
numbers have been declining.
The Germans still remain the most numerous element in
the foreign born population, constituting 26.5 per cent of this
group in 1 9 1 o ; 7 in fact only one other state, namely New York,
contained a greater number of persons of German birth than
7 The native Germans plus those born in this country, one or both of whose
parents were German, constituted 34.7 per cent.
16 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
did Illinois. Certain sections of the state, as St. Clair county,
were settled by German immigrants as early as i83O, 8 and the
steady stream of Settlers of the same nationality since that time
has contributed a sturdy stock to the peopling of the state.
The Irish made up 7.8 per cent of the foreign born in Illi-
nois, and the English 5 per cent, but if there were included the
English Canadians the figure for the British would be 8.1 per
cent. Owing to the fact that these two groups speak the Eng-
lish language they have never constituted so conspicuous or
definite an element of the population as the people from con-
tinental Europe and have been easily assimilated.
The French made up in 1910 less than one per cent of the
foreign born population in the state ; and even if to the natives
of France there be added those of Belgium, Switzerland, and
French Canada, the total would be only 2.8 per cent. In the
case of all the Latin countries the immigration has always been
small, except from Italy, whose sons and daughters in ever in-
creasing numbers have sought in this land of opportunity refuge
from hard conditions of life at home. The Italians made up
six per cent of the foreign born in the state in 1910.
Immigration from the Scandinavian countries is large and
has been steadily increasing, especially of those from Sweden.
In 1910 the natives of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden together
constituted 13.7 per cent of the foreign born population; and if
Holland's contribution be added the total from these four coun-
tries would be 14.9 per cent.
But the most striking and important change has been the
enormous increase in the Slavic elements of our population,
which began seriously in the eighties. So rapid has been the
immigration from Austria-Hungary and from Russia that it
has brought with it new and difficult problems of assimilation
and adjustment that were not presented in connection with the
earlier immigration. These are particularly serious because the
more recent immigration has coincided with a period of indus-
trial development and of urban concentration and has therefore
8 Faust, German Element in the United States, i : 457.
POPULATION 17
resulted in a concentration of the newer comers in the cities, par-
ticularly in Chicago. Thus, while the proportion of the foreign
born in the male population twenty-one years of age or over was
33.5 for Illinois in 1900, for Chicago it was 53.5, for Joliet
49.8, and for Rockford 47. 6. 9 Natives of Austria now rank
second only to the Germans in the foreign born population of
Illinois ( 13.6 per cent in 1910) ; if the natives of Hungary be
added the two together would constitute 16.9 per cent. The
Russian born population of Illinois ranks third among the for-
eign born elements in the state ( 12.4 per cent) . The following
table shows the country of origin of the foreign born popula-
tion of Illinois for the last five census periods :
FOREIGN BORN IN ILLINOIS BY NATIONALITY 10
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN
1870
1880
1890
1900
1910
Great Britain 1
Ireland J
192,960
75,859
"7,343
95,"3
124,498
88,775
"4,563
85,176
93,451
British America
32,550
34,043
39,525
50,595
45,233
Germany
203,758
235,786
338,382
332,169
319,182
Holland
4,180
5,012
8,762
21,916
14,402
Sweden
29,979
42,415
86,514
99,H7
115,422
Norway
11,880
16,970
30,339
29,979
32,913
Denmark
3,7"
6,029
12,044
15,686
17,368
France ,
10,911
8,524
8,540
7,787
7,966
Belgium
*
1,464
*
*
9,399
Switzerland
8,980
8,882
*
9,033
8,660
Italy
*
1,764
8,035
23,523
72,160
Austria
.... 2,099
2,608
8,087
18,212 ]
Bohemia
.... 7,350
13,408
26,627
38,570 L
163,020
Hungary
*
691
3,126
6,734 J
Russia
Poland
*
*
1,276
6,962
8,407
28,878
28,707 \
67,949 J"
149,016
Others
6,840
4,541
15,470
13,402
7i,946
Total 515,1
'Included in "others."
J,576 842,347 966,747 1,205,314
9 Reports of the Immigration Commission, 1911, 1:15.
10 The most recent addition to the conglomerate population of Illinois is
Mexicans, of whom it is reported that there are 12,000 scattered within a radius
of 120 miles of Chicago. Chicago Tribune, May 14, 1917.
i8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Any attempt to determine the distribution of the foreign
born population throughout the state of Illinois must be based
upon the statistics of county population, as township statistics
are not given by the census. But even within these wide areas
certain significant tendencies reveal themselves. There were
twenty-nine counties which at one or another of the last five
census periods had a larger percentage of foreign born than the
average for the state as a whole. In 1870 about one-fifth or
20.3 per cent of the population of the state was foreign born,
but a still larger proportion was to be found in the following
twenty-five counties: Jo Daviess, Stephenson, Winnebago,
Boone, Lake, Cook, Du Page, Kane, Lee, Rock Island, Henry,
La Salle, Kendall, Grundy, Will, Kankakee, Ford, Woodford,
Peoria, Adams, Madison, St. Clair, Monroe, Clinton, and
Washington. By 1910 this list of counties with an excess pro-
portion of foreign born had shrunk to eleven, which comprised
the following: Winnebago, Lake, Cook, Kane, Rock Island,
Bureau, La Salle, Grundy, Will, Peoria and Madison.
The first thing to be noticed about the distribution of the
foreign born is their comparatively wide distribution through-
out the state in 1870 and 1880, and their increasing concentra-
tion in a smaller number of counties since that time. In 1870
and 1880 the proportion of foreign born exceeded the general
average for the state in 25 counties; this number fell to 15 in
1890, to 12 in 1900, and to 1 1 in 1910. On the other hand the
number of counties, the proportion of whose foreign born was
less than ten per cent of their total population, rose steadily
from 43 in 1870 to 46 in 1880, to 50 in 1890, to 60 in 1900,
and to 66 in 1910. Inasmuch as the proportion of the foreign
born element in the state as a whole remained almost constant
20.3 percent in 1870 and 21.3 percent in 1910 these facts
indicate a tremendous concentration of the foreign born in a
small number of counties. In 1910 over 82 per cent of the for-
eign born population in the state were concentrated in 10 coun-
ties, and 72 per cent in the single county of Cook.
The second significant fact about the distribution of the for-
POPULATION 19
eign born element in the state is the way in which they hug the
northern border. If a line be drawn across the state from
Will county on the east to Rock Island on the west there would
be found in the list for 1910 only two counties south of this line,
namely Peoria and Madison. The few counties in the southern
and central parts of the state that were listed for 1870 and
1880 became more thoroughly saturated with native stock with
each successive census year. Madison and St. Clair still show
a considerable number of foreign born, but the proportion to
the total population has steadily fallen. The explanation of
this movement is to be found in the tendency of immigrants,
especially those from northern Europe, who have until recently
made up the bulk of the foreign born element in this state, to
settle along northern lines of latitude in their desire to be near
to kinsmen in Wisconsin and other neighboring states peopled^
largely by foreigners; and more recently in the extreme concen-
tration of the immigrants in Chicago, there to find employment
in the growing manufactures.
If the twelve cities in Illinois which at the census of 1910
had a total population of over 25,000 each be taken, there is to
be found in them the same concentration of the foreign born
that was observed in the case of the counties, only here it is
even more pronounced. While the foreign born made up only
2 1.3 per cent of the total population of the state on this date, in
the twelve cities named they constituted 32.6 per cent. In 1 870,
with the exception of Decatur, each city had more than one-fifth
of its population of alien birth, and ten of them had over one-
quarter. By 1880 the distribution was less widespread and with
each successive decade there has been a stronger concentration
of the alien elements in Chicago and a proportionate shrinkage
in most of the other cities. In the year 1910 Chicago had 65
per cent of all the foreign born in the state. But there are also
some small mining and manufacturing towns which do not ap-
pear in this group, a large share of whose population consists
of immigrants.
If the group of these twelve cities be considered as a whole,
20 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
a steadily increasing proportion of the foreign born elements
of the state population is to be found concentrated there. In
1870 only 35.3 per cent of the foreign born were to be found in
these cities, most of them residing in rural districts. In 1880
the percentage was 41.5, it was 60.0 in 1890, 66.5 in 1900, and
70.9 in 1910. In other words, at the beginning of the last half
century the foreign born element was predominantly rural; to-
day it is overwhelmingly urban.
The causes for the concentration of the immigrants or for-
eign born in the large cities and especially in Chicago is first of
all to be found in the exhaustion of the free or cheap land which
took the earlier settlers on to the farms. This outlet is now
practically closed, but the earlier immigration of Germans or
English two generations ago consisted of farmers who took up
the land and settled in groups. There is today many a com-
munity in the state which is predominantly of one racial strain
or another as a result of this colonizing movement. 11
A second cause of urban concentration is the development
of factory industry which attracts and employs the immigrant
in urban industrial centers. The industrial development of Illi-
nois dates only from the eighties and has consequently been
operative only a comparatively short time. The city itself is a
recent growth, which has been made possible by improved
means of transportation and communication and by the use of
machinery. In 1870 Chicago was the only city in the state with
a population over twenty-five thousand. Consequently there
could not as yet have been much urban concentration.
Another reason for the increasing concentration of the for-
eign born in cities is their desire to be near friends and kinsmen
who speak their own language. This is especially true of the
recent Italian and Slavic immigrants. Handicapped by igno-
rance, poverty, and lack of training, they must find immediate
employment in an unskilled occupation, and this the city offers.
11 Wilson, History and Directory for Southeast Missouri and Southern Illinois
(1875-1876), illustrates this idea when he says that the inhabitants of Clinton
county are principally Germans (p. 163), the people of Jackson county are mostly
English (p. 165), and Monroe county is settled mostly by Germans (p. 175).
POPULATION 21
Moreover, they are better able to adjust themselves to their
new environment if they are near members of their own nation-
ality who can advise and succor them.
And finally, as an explanation of this massing of the alien
elements in Chicago, it must be remembered that Chicago is the
great distributing point for immigrants to the west and north-
west. Some of those now resident there may move on to other
sections after they have learned the language and become ac-
quainted with the industrial opportunities open to them else-
where.
Half way between the native stock and the foreign born
stands the Negro population, practically all of whom have
drifted into the state since the Civil War. In 1870 there were
only 28,762 Negroes in Illinois, but since that time they have
been increasing steadily and, with the exception of the decade
18801890, at a more rapid rate than the white population.
Especially rapid was the growth in the decade ending with
1 870, when it was 277 per cent or almost four times the rate of
increase of the white population. As a result of this influx of
Negroes the proportion which they constitute of the total popu-
lation has increased very steadily from i.i per cent in 1870 to
1.9 per cent in 1910. But the absolute number is still small,
amounting only to 109,049 at the last census.
They are strongly massed in the southern counties and in
three of them constitute a considerable proportion of the total
population. Thus in Pulaski in 1910 they made up 37.3 per
cent, in Alexander 35.6 per cent, and in Massac 19.5 per cent.
In no other county did they constitute as much as eight per cent.
From these southern counties they gradually filter through the
rest of the state. Like the foreign born they show a consider-
able tendency to concentrate in cities, but Cairo is the only
city in the state whose population is markedly affected by them,
37.5 per cent of its population in 1910 consisting of Negroes.
No other city has as much as 10 per cent.
The picture of the foreign born population is necessarily
one of change and movement; scarcely less so is that of the
22 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
native born population. In 1818, just a hundred years ago,
John Bristed, in his Resources of America, said the Americans
were the "most locomotive people" he had ever seen. This
characterization is still true, and Illinoisians are today appar-
ently among the most restless of the seething people of this
country. Any discussion of the movement of the native born
population in Illinois must consider two phases of the subject,
namely, the immigration of native born whites from other states
to Illinois, and the emigration of natives of Illinois to other
states. These will be taken up in turn.
It was of course natural, in fact necessary, that Illinois, one
of the newer states, should be peopled by settlers from the older
sections. The native born population in 1870 was a remark-
able alloy of north and south, those in the northern half of the
state being descended largely from New England pioneers, but
those in the southern half tracing their ancestry back to cavalier
or other southern stock. While the northerners exhibit many
Yankee traits, "the 'Egyptians,' as they call the natives of
Cairo, Thebes, and other grotesque namesakes of Old Nile, are
in looks, in dialect, in habits of thought, and in instincts and
traditions, markedly of the South." 12
From the population statistics of the census it is possible
to construct a table which will show the extent to which the
American born population of Illinois is made up of natives of
other states and of those born within the state boundaries. The
table on the following page shows these facts for the last five
census periods.
This table shows that the process of settlement was by no
means completed by 1870; two generations only had grown
up within the state since it was first settled, and most of the
people then residing in it had been born outside the state. Only
48 per cent of the population in 1870 had been born in Illinois,
but this proportion steadily increased, reaching 56 per cent in
1880, 57 per cent in 1890, 60 per cent in 1900, and 68 per cent
in 1910. That is to say, while the Illinois stock made up less
12 Munroe, "The Heart of the United States," Atlantic Monthly, 102:325.
POPULATION
than half the population of the state in 1870, it constituted
over two-thirds in 1910. At the same time the aggregate
American born element remained almost constant, at about 80
per cent of the total population.
NATIVE BORN POPULATION IN ILLINOIS
1870
1880
Number
Per cent
of total
population
Number
Per cent
of total
population
Total population of Illinois
American born populatior
of Illinois
2,539,891
2,024,693
1,189,503
IOO.O
79-7
48.0
3,077,871
2,494,295
1,709,520
IOO.O
81.0
56.0
Born in Illinoi
s
1890
1900
1910
NUMBER
Per cent
of total
population
Number
Per cent
of total
population
Number
Per cent
of total
population
3,826,352
2,984,004
2,196,288
IOO.O
78.0
57.0
4,821,550
3,854,803
2,893,857
IOO.O
79-9
60.0
5,638,591
4,433,277
3,406,638
IOO.O
78.6
68.0
It is manifest, however, that if the percentage of native
stock remains constant while those born within the state con-
stitute an increasing proportion of the whole, the infusion of
native born from outside the state must be declining relatively,
if not absolutely. An examination of the statistics of move-
ment to and from the state shows this to be the case. The per-
centage of the American born in Illinois coming from other
states in the union steadily declined during this period from
41.7 per cent of the native born population in 1870 to 31.5 per
cent in 1880, 25.7 per cent in 1890, 24.9 per cent in 1900, and
22.6 per cent in 1910.
This was of course a perfectly natural movement, for not
only was Illinois itself being filled up, but the states farther
west offered even greater inducements to settlement in the way
of free homesteads. Indeed, during the decades 1870-1880
and 1 880-1 890 there was an absolute falling off in the numbers
24 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of native born Americans migrating into Illinois. Transcon-
tinental railways carried intending settlers rapidly past Illinois
to the free farms of the boundless west. Not until the desirable
public domain was practically exhausted did this movement
spend itself and the settlement of Illinois begin again. Thus in
the two decades ending in 1900 and 1910 the number of natives
of other states settling in Illinois has increased absolutely,
though relatively the movement has not maintained itself.
Moreover it is interesting to note that whereas most of this
group down to 1900 had been recruited from the eastern states,
in 1910 there was a distinct back-eddy and Missouri appears
among the five states most important in this regard, with a
contribution of 85,161 to the population of Illinois.
A further inquiry in detail as to which states of the union
supplied Illinois with the American born stock, which flowed in
almost as rapidly as the foreign born, shows that the most con-
spicuous contributors were the states to the east. The largest
numbers came from the five states of New York, Pennsylvania,
Ohio, Indiana, and Kentucky, although as just stated MissouiT
should be included in the list in 1910. In general the move-
ment into Illinois followed the same lines as foreign immigra-
tion, moving with curious directness along parallels of latitude.
From New York and Pennsylvania, through Ohio and Indiana,
and even from Kentucky into the southern counties of the state,
the movement proceeded almost straight west.
The inflow of citizens from Indiana increased steadily from
1870 to 1910 and was the only one of the chief contributing
states to show a constant increase. The contributions from
New York, Ohio, and Pennsylvania decreased pretty steadily
from decade to decade with only a slight recovery in the decade
ending with 1900, while that from Kentucky, after declining for
thirty years, now shows an upward tendency. The reason for
these differences is doubtless to be found in the fact that the
industrial opportunities of Illinois are better than those of her
nearest neighbors, Indiana and Kentucky, while they are not
sufficiently different from those to be found in the other three
POPULATION 25
states to attract their citizens in increasing volume. In every
case, however, the percentage of persons residing in Illinois
and born in the specified state has declined in proportion to the
whole native born population.
It is not possible to state in further detail in what part of
Illinois the immigrants from other states settled in Illinois, ex-
cept for the years 1870 and 1880, as the data on this point are
not given in subsequent census reports. In 1870 the largest
number from New York state settled in Kane and Winnebago
counties; in 1880 in Cook and Will. For persons from Penn-
sylvania, Stephenson and Cook counties were the favorite ob-
jective in both 1 870 and 1880. Ohioans settled in McLean and
Champaign in 1870 and in Cook and McLean in 1880; Indiana
residents moved to Vermilion and Champaign in 1870 and to
Vermilion and Cook in 1880; while those from Kentucky set-
tled first in the counties of Sangamon and McLean, and later in
Cook and Sangamon. The fact that in four out of five cases
Cook county attracted the largest number of settlers and in the
fifth case next to the largest number in 1880 already indicates
what probably has held true ever since, namely that Chicago
rather than the agricultural counties has proved the lodestone
to persons moving into the state from other parts of the United
States.
Even more striking than the movement of native born
Americans into Illinois has been the exodus of those born
within the state to other El Dorados farther west. New as the
state is, it is not so new as other states and to them Illinois has
lost heavily of its sons and daughters. In 1870 and 1880 more
native Americans moved to Illinois than left it, but by 1890 the
tide had turned and with each succeeding decade the exodus be-
came greater. In 1870 the proportion of persons born in Illi-
nois and leaving the state was one-fifth, in 1880 one-fourth, and
in 1890, 1900, and 1910 over one-fourth. Five states have
absorbed most of these wanderers, namely: Indiana, Iowa,
Kansas : Missouri, and Nebraska, though at each census period
other states have appeared as temporary rivals.
26 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
In 1870 about one-fifth ( 19.5 per cent) of the persons born
in Illinois were living outside the state, the largest number being
found in Missouri (72,324) ; in addition to the states named
above, Wisconsin and Minnesota had also received consider-
able contributions. By 1880 the proportion of Illinoisians liv-
ing outside the state was almost exactly a quarter (24.5 per
cent), most of whom were in Kansas (106,670). The situa-
tion shows clearly a strong westward movement, spilling the
surplus population of Illinois over Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, and
Nebraska, with smaller splotches in Texas and California and a
back-eddy into Indiana. 13
By 1890 the proportion of the native population of Illinois
who have left the state is still greater (27.1 per cent) ; Kansas
again claims the largest number (?37,9O3), 14 but together
with Nebraska ( 107,262), reaches in this decade the climax of
its popularity, for after this the number in eacn of these states
declines. In addition to the states listed, California and Colo-
rado each attract growing numbers.
The decade ending with 1900 shows a slight decline in the
proportion of the natives of Illinois who have settled elsewhere
to 25.9 per cent though the absolute number keeps grow-
ing. Missouri (179,342) has become the most popular state.
Iowa (142,234) has reached its zenith, and the continuance of
the far westward movement gives to California 42,304 per-
sons. The census for 1910 shows little change, except a strong
movement to Oklahoma (71,085), while the number in Cali-
fornia grows to 87,291.
The facts just cited leave no doubt as to the mobility of the
population of Illinois. The people slip easily over the state
lines, whether moving in or out. 15 This mobility is not peculiar
to the state, but is and always has been a marked characteristic
of the American people, wherever located. It seems to be
13 See an excellent map in Tenth Census of the United States, i : 385.
14 In curious confirmation of this fact the writer is informed by Mr. J. A.
Farrand of Griggsville, Illinois, that in the early nineties, a larger proportion of
the members of the Griggsville Baptist church were living in Kansas than at home.
15 This is doubtless true also of county lines, but unfortunately no statistical
data exist to prove it.
POPULATION 27
somewhat more marked, however, in the case of Illinois than
of most other states. For instance, in 1910 the proportion of
persons in the United States as a whole who lived outside of the
state of their birth was 21.7 per cent, but for Illinois it was 27.7
per cent. For the same year Illinois was exceeded only by New
York in the number of persons born in and leaving the state and
only by Oklahoma in the number of domestic immigrants who
settled in the state.
To make the effect of this interstate migration upon the
composition of the population of Illinois a little more concrete,
let it be supposed that every native born person in the United
States should return to the place of his birth. What would be
the effect of such a home-coming upon Illinois? In 1870 Illi-
nois would have lost 835,190 domestic immigrants, but on the
other hand would have gained 288,418 natives of the state who
had moved to other states ; the total population would have been
less by 546,772. In 1880 the loss would have been 784,775,
and the gain 553,889 ; or a net loss of 230,886. In 1890 for the
first time the number of domestic immigrants, 758,822, was less
than the natives of Illinois living in other states, or 817,717;
consequently the state would have gained 58,895 from an ex-
change. In 1900 and 1910 the same thing was true, and in
these two years a universal home-coming would have netted the
state 51,691 and 310,896 respectively.
These figures indicate to some extent the loss which Illinois
has suffered by the emigration of her native born population;
and the loss is not confined to the number of those who leave,
for the descendants of those who left during the earlier decades
are themselves now grown up and they and their children would
have been counted in the population of Illinois, had their father
or grandfather not left the state. Moreover, as the figures
show only the number of those living in the given localities on
the date specified, and as the number of natives of Illinois in
other states has been constantly growing at each successive cen-
sus, it must be concluded, in view of the mortality which must
have occurred among those enumerated at the earlier periods,
that the number of emigrants from Illinois is even greater than
the statistics show and that there has been a steadily increas-
ing stream out of the state between the decennial census periods.
The facts are fairly obvious, but the causal explanation of
these facts is more difficult. How can the great restlessness,
the high degree of mobility of the American born population
be explained? The earlier movement into the state was prob-
ably occasioned by the agricultural opportunities; in 1870 many
came and few left. But 1 870 witnessed the height of the move-
ment into Illinois up "to that time; the next two decades saw a
decided falling off. In 1900 and 1910, however, the industrial
attractiveness of Chicago more than compensated for the
lessened lure of Illinois land, and the number of native immi-
grants increased again, absolutely if not relatively. Much of
the movement into and out of the state has been merely across
state lines, which often denotes a less radical change than the
transfer from the farm to the city within the same state. Indi-
ana and Kentucky contributed a considerable proportion of
domestic immigrants to Illinois, while from a third to a half
of those who left the state settled in adjoining states. Illinois
seems to have occupied the position of a sort of halfway house,
whose restless population sojourned there awhile but never
really settled down.
The principal cause of the emigration of the natives of
Illinois to other states farther west whither most of them
have gone has undoubtedly been the existence of cheaper land
there. With the increase of population and the filling up of the
state the price of land has gone up and more careful and inten-
sive methods of agriculture have become necessary. Many an
early settler has thought it to his advantage to sell out his farm
at a higher price, pocket the "unearned increment," and move
farther west to cheaper land, where he could repeat the process.
But another factor, closely connected with this, has prob-
ably been even more important in inducing emigration from
Illinois. For many of the early settlers and natives of the state,
bred to primitive conditions, with consequent careless tillage
POPULATION 29
and a one crop system, a change in methods of farming would
have proved more difficult than a physical transfer of their
families and themselves to another state where they could con-
tinue the same practices. Men changed more easily than meth-
ods. Hence there may be noted a steady movement to the
newer settlements, in turn, of Iowa, Missouri, Kansas, Ne-
braska, Texas, and Oklahoma. There, with new land, they may
repeat the exploitative methods of farming which are no longer
profitable in Illinois, but to which they are bound by long cus-
tom. The growing migration of residents of Illinois to Cali-
fornia may be explained in part by the desire for a more con-
genial climate than their native state affords, and in part by the
growing wealth of Illinoisians which permits them to gratify
their inclinations in this regard.
Mere size or growth in numbers is not in itself a desirable
thing. The most populous state is not necessarily the best off
economically. But in the case of Illinois during the past half
century the growth of population has undoubtedly responded
to improving economic conditions, and has in turn stimulated
the production of wealth and promoted the economic well-being
of the people. The increasing concentration of the population
in cities is a universal phenomenon to which Illinois is no excep-
tion, and is a result of improvements in methods of transporta-
tion and production.
In spite of the comparative newness of the state and the
large immigration of foreign born, the population of Illinois is
predominantly of native stock. But it has undoubtedly gained
from the admixture of racial elements within its borders. The
typical son of Illinois sturdy, independent, restless even, yet
conservative and loyal shows in his composite nature some of
the best qualities which have been contributed from so many
diverse quarters. In its people Illinois possesses some of the
best stock of the nation, whose value cannot be estimated by a
mere counting of heads, but whose qualities may be trusted to
maintain the state upon the proud eminence to which they have
already elevated it.
II. THE GROWTH OF EDUCATION, ART, AND
LETTERS
BY HENRY B. FULLER
THE World's Columbian exposition of 1893 marked an
era in the general development of the United States.
Especially strong, of course, was its influence on the state of
Illinois and on the city of Chicago. Art and its amenities were
found to be desirable and necessary in the life of the people.
The elaborate celebration of an important historical anniver-
sary developed in the state a heightened consciousness of the sig-
nificance and dignity of its own past. A wide and hearty union
for a great endeavor of a nature largely festal and aesthetic,
presently led the way to an ampler cooperation in handling
the practical problems and difficulties of the times. Effects may
be deep and lasting, however, without being immediate. In
Chicago itself a dozen years or so were to elapse before a com-
prehensive plan should be formulated and announced for apply-
ing the artistic lessons learned in the White City to the needs of
the city at large. A much shorter length of time, fortunately,
elapsed before the administrative skill gained in the handling of
a novel problem predominantly aesthetic was applied practically
to the amelioration of the social and political conditions of
the day.
Meanwhile the impetus communicated to educational inter-
ests proceeded with an ever-increasing acceleration. Building
became active with each of the three great universities of the
state. The University of Chicago, whose first halls and dormi-
tories had been put up during the building of the Columbian
exposition itself and in the same vicinity, added other halls and
dormitories to meet its rapidly increasing needs: it became
almost a fashion among Chicago's wealthy and well-disposed
to set their names commemoratively among the gargoyles and
30
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 31
crocketed gables of scholastic Gothic facades. The most
notable group of structures erected during this time was that of
the four physical laboratories ranged round Hull Court. North-
western University, between the years 1893 and 1898, erected
on its campus a succession of buildings varied in physiognomy
and serving various purposes a library, a music hall, an as-
sembly hall, and others. The University of Illinois, under the
presidency of Andrew S. Draper, aided by the friendly interest
and cooperation of Governor John P. Altgeld, which was imme-
diate from the first day of President Draper's term, also entered
upon a new period of building. The state legislature of 1905
made a liberal appropriation, and there followed a library, an
observatory, a president's house, a power house, and certain
shops. The handsome Agricultural Building was author-
ized in 1898. During the decade 1891-1901 both Northwest-
ern University and the University of Illinois established (or
took over) the former early, the latter rather later differ-
ent professional schools in Chicago.
During these same years the educational system of the state
underwent a great extension, noticeably in the matter of new
normal schools; and building in this direction, too, was active.
The Illinois State Normal University at Normal (1857) and
the Southern Illinois State Normal University at Carbondale
(1869) were supplemented by three new institutions appropri-
ately placed: the Eastern Illinois State Normal School at
Charleston, and the Northern Illinois State Normal School at
De Kalb, both authorized by the legislature in 1895; and the
Western (or Military Tract) State Normal School at Macomb,
authorized in 1899. The buildings at Charleston and De Kalb
were constructed in a romantic, castellated style in consonance
with the personal preferences of Governor Altgeld himself, as
was a library and gymnasium building erected at Normal dur-
ing the same period. The building at Macomb expressed an
easy command of the classically palatial, and more recent con-
structions round it have heightened the effect.
During the nineties, under Dr. John W. Cook, a new spirit
32 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
developed at Normal ; and its effect was felt in the other schools
of the system. The endeavor was to put instruction on a basis
of psychology, developing a consistent educational philosophy
as a rational foundation for method ; to give greater recognition
to natural science and a larger place to drawing, music, and
physical training; to bring about a material increase in the num-
ber of buildings; to give greater definiteness to the work of the
training department; to modify courses so as to bring students
of a better grade of scholarship; and to develop a shorter
course for advanced students and thus increase the number of
graduates. The normal university at Carbondale, by reason of
its geographical situation and of the special social characteris-
tics of the section, served in large measure the purposes of a
high school; the other schools, however, have come, in vary-
ing degree, to assimilate themselves with or to impose them-
selves upon the primary school systems of the towns in which
they are situated, thus finding abundant material and oppor-
tunity for practice in the detailed work of teaching.
Several technological schools were founded during this
same period. In Chicago, the Armour Institute of Technology,
which had originated in the Armour Mission (1886), opened
its principal building in 1893. The Lewis Institute began its
career in 1896. From 1897 dated the Bradley Polytechnic In-
stitute of Peoria. It enjoyed, at its inception, the advice of the
president of the University of Chicago and the services of the
university architect ; its Horology Hall is unique in the state. It
is affiliated with the University of Chicago. In 1901, the Chi-
cago Institute, which had profited from the direction of Colonel
Francis W. Parker, was incorporated in the same institution,
and the new building designed for its use was occupied in 1903.
In 1898, Archbishop Spalding of Peoria, established there the
Spalding Institute, a high school, with some technological fea-
tures, for young Catholics.
During the two decades between the " great fire " and the
Columbian exposition the public school system of Chicago kept
up a regular and rapid growth. The number of pupils enrolled
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 33
rose from less than forty thousand to more than one hundred
and forty thousand, and the number of teachers was more than
quintupled.
The middle nineties were important years for the four great
libraries of Chicago. The Newberry Library, a free library
of reference, had been able, after legal delays, to begin its
course in iSSy, 1 under Dr. William F. Poole, and occupied its
own new building in 1893. Its collection of books, pamphlets,
plates, manuscripts, and maps had come to number, in 1917,
some three hundred and sixty-five thousand items. The John
Crerar Library was incorporated in 1894, as a free library of
reference, with the design of confining itself to scientific and
technical literature. Although the construction of its own build-
ing, long planned, has been delayed, a collection of five hundred
thousand books and pamphlets has been brought together. The
library of the University of Chicago had its foundation, or at
least its nucleus, in a large purchase of books and pamphlets
made in Germany. In 1917, seven hundred thousand repre-
sented the total figure of its collection. The Chicago Public
Library, which had been founded in 1872 and had occupied,
during a quarter of a century, varying accommodations of
greater or less suitability, was established in its own new building
in 1 897. During the succeeding twenty years it was to put out a
hundred branches and some nine hundred agencies, reaching the
stage where it served twenty thousand persons daily, and annu-
ally circulated five million volumes, in seventeen languages, for
home use. In 1893 was incorporated the Chicago Library
Club; and in 1896 there was devised among several of the
larger libraries a scheme of cooperation by which specialization
was introduced and a duplication of departments avoided. In
various parts of the state a growing local consciousness came to
be expressed in the town libraries. Thus, the Withers Library,
at Bloomington, made a special collection of the works of
1 The death of the wife of the testator, Walter L. Newberry, in December,
1885, ultimately made a fund of two million five hundred thousand dollars avail-
able for library purposes. Chicago Tribune, December n, 12, 1885.
34 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
McLean county authors. Collections of local authors were
formed by the public libraries of Evanston and Galena. Knox
College, at Galesburg, established a collection of the authors
among its faculty and alumni. The public library of Belleville
expressed the particular trend of its culture in a large collection,
one-third of which was in the German language.
Though the influences of the Columbian exposition, in their
widest reaches, were still reserved as concerned Chicago
for the future, a number of interesting cultural developments,
more or less immediate, may be noted, both in art and in litera-
ture. In the autumn of 1 893 was incorporated the Field Colum-
bian Museum, made possible by the gift of Mr. Marshall Field ;
the collection was based in large part upon the various speci-
mens left behind by the Columbian exposition, and was housed
in the extensive and beautiful Art Building of the exposition,
which had been preserved for the purpose. The Art Institute
received the gift of the Ryerson Library, a building which
should care adequately for its growing collections of books,
prints, and photographs. Between 1893 and 1895, the Central
Art Association, composed of a group of artists and writers,
formed collections of works of art by western men and sent
them on tours through Illinois and states adjacent. In 1896
took place in Chicago the first annual exposition of the Society
of Western Artists. Shortly afterwards came the revival of
the Chicago Society of Artists, or rather, an amalgamation of
several art societies including the Cosmopolitan Art Club, a
polyglot organization which had been active during the con-
struction period of the fair. The effect of the great scheme of
mural decoration at Chicago had been felt throughout the state.
In 1896, the Peoria Public Library, which had been built the
year before and was to house an art club and a society of the
allied arts, was decorated with a series of great panels the
work of a pair of Chicago artists, and one of the most striking
manifestations of wall decoration in the state. In 1898 an ex-
tensive set of murals was painted by Professor Newton A.
Wells for the stately forecourt of the Library of the University
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 35
of Illinois. During this period of building activity a state
board of examiners of architects was established in 1897 at
Springfield.
During the early nineties, under the encouragement of the
general conditions, a literary group lifted its wings in Chicago.
Novels appeared. Some of them drew on the past history of
the state. 2 Others endeavored to fix the life of the place and
the day as it rose. In 1895 was formed the Caxton Club, de-
voted to bookishness ; also the characteristically-named Culture
Club, besides other clubs (composed largely of women) , of like
aims, even if not so explicitly labeled. The year before, The
Chap Book, first and best of a long line of miniature magazines,
had been transferred from Cambridge to Chicago by a Chicago
student. It enjoyed an easy command of novel European facil-
ities and lived on in an atmosphere of increased cosmopolitan-
ism for several years. It came to be companioned by The
House Beautiful, which applied in such manner some of the
lessons learned at the fair as to extend the amenities of house-
furnishing and decoration well into home life. And so far
did interest in the home outrun interest in literary culture that
The House Beautiful became the more successful and lasting
of the pair.
A cultural influence felt widely and beneficially throughout
the state has been that exerted by the Illinois Farmers' Institute,
established in 1895 under Governor Yates. It was designed to
assist and encourage useful education among the farmers and to
develop the agricultural resources of the state among its di-
rectors the superintendent of public instruction, the professor
of agriculture at the University of Illinois, and the presidents
of the state board of agriculture, of the State Horticultural So-
ciety, and of the State Dairymen's Association. A network of
congressional and county organizations was soon formed, with
2 Among historical novelists who have dealt with Illinois at various periods
are: Mary Hartwell Catherwood, The Story of Tonty; Emerson Hough, The
Mississippi Bubble; Randall Parrish, When Wilderness Was King; Edward
Eggleston, The Graysons ; Joseph Kirkland, Zury and The McVeys ; and Clark E.
Carr, The lllini.
36 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the hearty cooperation of the state's public school system and of
the University of Illinois, which in a large measure led the way.
Good work has been done through local meetings, held in every
county once a year.
In the last decade of the century, out-of-door life and the
general interest in sport entered upon new phases. Football, as
at present known, came in shortly after 1890 and was well
established among western universities by 1895. Each of the
three large universities of the state arranged its athletic field
with especial reference to football. The concrete grandstand
of the University of Chicago developed interesting features in
construction and in architectural style.
These sanre years saw the establishment of the first golf
clubs in Illinois. The Chicago Golf Club was organized in
1894, and was transferred to Wheaton the next year. Clubs
were organized at Lake Forest in 1895 and 1896; and the next
few years witnessed the planting of numerous new clubs in other
Chicago suburbs, north, south, and west. From the golf club
to the country club was but a step a natural and inevitable
one. Thus rose a purely American institution, made possible
by the special conditions of American society and made neces-
sary by the demand for a larger infusion of nature in a life
which was tending more and more to the urban. This type of
social bacillus, once established, propagated itself rapidly; all
over the state rose country clubs, the need of which was rather
less imperative than for the great urban center, yet the social
life of which became as rich in wholesomeness and in the general
development of the amenities.
It was but a short step from the life of the country club to
that of the country house. Estates began to shape themselves
on favorable sites along Lake Michigan's north shore, and
in the interior of the state along the choicer reaches of such
rivers as the Illinois and the Rock. An " artist colony" on the
Rock river, near Oregon, in the midst of country estates, com-
pleted its twentieth year in 1917.
All this fair superstructure had not arisen during a time
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 37
which had given no thought to the sober fundamentals. Con-
sideration of political and social betterment were much in evi-
dence. The Civic Federation of Chicago began its useful career
in i894, 3 though a Citizen's Association had been formed
twenty years earlier. From the federation's committee on
political action was organized in 1896, the Municipal Voters
League which, within a few years, did so much to raise alder-
manic standard in Chicago. In 1901 followed naturally the
Legislative Voters League, which endeavored to do for the
state legislature what the other league had done for Chicago's
common council. 4 In 1903 was organized the City Club, which
was to busy itself fruitfully with Chicago's municipal affairs in
general. Hull House, which had been opened in 1889, was fol-
lowed, in 1894, by Chicago Commons, an ameliorative institu-
tion of similar type. The settlements of Northwestern Uni->
versity and the University of Chicago, established in the early
nineties, were incorporated in 1898. Each of these and vari-
ous others besides had for its object the bringing of social
light and social betterment into some one of the hitherto neg-
lected districts of the city. 5
In 1907, when the number of children in the public schools
of the state had come to be close upon a million, .the legislature
created an educational commission, with Honorable Francis G.
Blair, state superintendent of public instruction, as chairman.
This body reported in 1909 a re-codification of existing school
laws. In 1911 the school fund of the state was raised from one
million to two million ; and two years later there was an increase
of another million. During the decade from 1900 to 1910
there was naturally a corresponding advance among the uni-
versities and the privately endowed colleges. With the installa-
tion of Dr. Edmund J. James at Urbana, after he had left the
presidency of Northwestern for that of Illinois, an era of easier
and more fruitful relations with the state legislature ensued.
8 Bulletins and leaflets of the Civic Federation, 1911, 1913, and 1916.
4 Bulletins of the League, 1914, 1915, and 1917.
5 Carbaugh, Human Welfare Work in Chicago.
38 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The university's widened scope and increasing prosperity were
evidenced tangibly in the number and variety of buildings
erected upon the campus, and near it, from 1905 onward. To
pass over some of the minor structures put up during President
James' first years, there may be noted the Physics Building
(1908), the addition to the Natural History Building (1908
1909), and Lincoln Hall (19101911). An equal activity was
displayed by the University of Chicago. The most noteworthy
buildings erected there at about this time were the four which
formed the Tower Group ( 1903) : Hutchinson Hall, the Rey-
nolds Club, Mitchell Tower, and Mandel Assembly Hall.
Northwestern's original contribution during this period was a
school of commerce (1908), sponsored by some sixty of Chi-
cago's business men. A school of commerce and finance was
also established at James Millikin University, Decatur, an in-
stitution which, superimposed on an earlier university at Lin-
coln, had suddenly sprung in 1903, into prominence and pros-
perity. This example was presently followed at Illinois and at
Chicago : a college of commerce at the former, and a school of
commerce and administration at the latter. During these same
years there was a period of marked building activity for the Illi-
nois Woman's College, at Jacksonville, and a general financial
and constructional quickening at Knox. 6 At Illinois College the
presence of a president from Chicago brought welcome aid
from Dr. D. K. Pearsons, whose wide and well-known philan-
thropies always favored educational institutions. Rockford
Seminary (Rockford College since 1892), which has always
maintained an easy primacy among the women's colleges of the
state, celebrated, in 1904, the fiftieth anniversary of the gradua-
tion of its first class, when an elaborate "Jubilee Book" was
published by its alumnae association.
6 In 1908 Knox, stimulated by the promise of conditional gifts amounting
to one hundred thousand dollars, entered upon a campaign to secure additional
contributions toward a total endowment fund of a quarter of a million. The
full amount secured was two hundred and sixty thousand dollars, a sum sufficient
to cover all past indebtedness and to meet all annual expenses; and the Central
Church became the scene of an enthusiastic celebration. Webster, Seventy-five
Significant Years. The Story of Knox College, 1837-1912, p. 106.
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 39
In 1899 tne Illinois State Historical Society was organ-
ized at Springfield, and an act of the general assembly in 1903
brought it into organic relations with the state historical library.
The society began almost at once publication of its Transactions
and of its quarterly Journal, and has continued to hold annual
meetings for the presentation of papers. In 1909 was formed
the Illinois library extension commission; and in the same year
the state art commission was organized. ' Such a union of activ-
ities, literary, historical, and artistic, was paralleled and con-
tinued by corresponding activities in the state legislature. Be-
tween 1901 and 1913 numerous commissions were appointed
for the suitable commemoration of historical events (as the
participation of Illinois soldiers at Vicksburg) ; for the com-
memoration of state governors, early or recent (as Carlin,
Oglesby, and Altgeld) ; or for the marking or preservation of
historic sites (as those of Fort Massac and Fort Edwards).
The University of Illinois, working both at Urbana and
Springfield, became a strong factor in the promotion of this
acute historical consciousness. In 1901, and again in 1903, the
state had granted small appropriations for collecting and pub-
lishing documents relating to the northwest and to the state of
Illinois. In 1905, the trustees of the state historical library,
influenced by the discovery of a mass of old French documents
records of Cahokia, which had been transferred to the court-
house of St. Clair county, at Belleville organized an advisory
commission composed of professors of history in six of the
leading colleges and normal schools of the state; research at
once became active and a series of publications edited at Urbana
was begun in 1907. In the autumn of 1909 the University of
Illinois decided to supplement officially the work of the state his-
torical library, and plans were laid which led to the organiza-
tion of the Illinois historical survey as a department of the
graduate school. The work that of a laboratory of state his-
tory came to center in Professor C. W. Alvord, of the history
department, with the design of facilitating research, of encour-
aging the production of monographs on Illinois history, and
40 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of producing ultimately a really scientific history of the
state.
One curious phase of this general movement was the trans-
fer of the old Cahokia courthouse, dating from the eighteenth
century (which had been shown at the St. Louis exposition in
1904), to the island in Jackson Park, the site of the earlier ex-
position in Chicago. The transfer was completed in 1906,
under the auspices of the Chicago Historical Society. The up-
right logs of hewn walnut were reassembled under the three
flags of France, Great Britain, and the United States; and the
ceremony was attended by the twenty-eight judges of the new
municipal court in a body. Certain furniture and documents
accompanied the building itself. Another curious turn in the
way of historical celebration was made possible by the retention
of the three Columbus caravels in the waters of Jackson Park.
For several years, intermittently, the Knights of Columbus, a
Catholic organization, gave pageants on the basis afforded by
these ships. In the vicinity of the still-existing facsimile repro-
duction of La Rabida convent, Ferdinand and Isabella often
held court in suitable costuming; and Columbus, from the deck
of the Santa Maria, discovered America again and again. Nor
should some other dues paid the historical sense go unnoticed.
In Chicago the Calumet Club for many years gave an annual old
settlers' reception as long in fact, as the club itself lasted and
the old settlers remained to be received. Through many parts
of the state old settlers' societies had come to be established;
that of La Salle county, among others, gained some promi-
nence. And as these faded from the scene Colonial Dames and
Daughters of the Revolution came forward to give a continu-
ing stimulus to our heightened sense of the historic past.
Still emphasizing improved transportation and communica-
tion as valuable and vital adjuncts to cultural development, one
must touch upon the advance, during these years, of the motor
car, the extension of the trolley, local and interurban, of the
telephone, and of rural free delivery. Though the first auto-
mobile show in America was held only in 1900, the number of
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 41
cars in the state of Illinois alone has risen to more than a quarter
of a million. " Highways," variously named, began to traverse
the state, and plans for a comprehensive system of good roads
to engage the attention of the public. During the decade 1902
1912, the mileage of Illinois' electric roads rose from fifteen
hundred to more than three thousand. There was an extensive
radiation of lines from Chicago and a still more notable exten-
sion of interurban service through the central counties of the
state particularly between Danville and Springfield, with
extensions northward to Peoria and Bloomington, and south-
ward to East St. Louis and beyond. During the same dec-
ade the number of telephones in use in the state rose from
428,301 to 1,689,074 a quadrupling which spoke eloquently
for the banishment of isolation from the rural districts. The
system of rural free delivery had begun experimentally al-
most on probation in 1897; the postmaster-general was
given a small appropriation of forty thousand dollars. In 1900
there were but 1,276 routes established throughout the whole
country. In 1902, the year when a permanent organization was
effected, there were 8,466; in 1904 there were over twenty-five
thousand routes in operation, and the annual appropriation for
1904-1905 had risen to twenty million dollars. In the spread
of this advantageous new feature of country life, Illinois
profited by its proportionate share.
About the year 1900 Chicago became aware of the inade-
quacy of its earlier park system. This chain of pleasure-
grounds and boulevards, authorized in 1869 but interrupted in
its completion by the " great fire " of 1871, had long been com-
pleted and long outgrown. New parks and playgrounds were
needed outside the original system and particularly within it.
A special park commission had been created in 1899, with a
view to providing municipal playgrounds ; and in 1905 the three
park systems of the city were authorized to take steps that led,
within a few years, to the creation of a triple system of small
parks, for neighborhoods at a distance from the large parks.
Within a few years the south park commission had opened ten
4 2
all-the-year-round recreation parks, ranging in area from three
acres to sixty, and had spent five million dollars on grounds,
building and equipment, field houses, gymnasia, bathing-pools
and all the recently realized paraphernalia of right urban living.
The project developed along lines purely original, following no
outside models; it arose naturally to meet with adequacy the
needs of the local situation. Within a short time the field
houses became headquarters for hundreds of neighborhood
clubs, social and educational; branches of the Public Library
were also established in most of them. The system, once under
way, spread until the south side had some twenty-five of these
parks and the north and west sides almost as many more. The
city's own system of municipal playgrounds and of bathhouses
kept pace with the advance made by the park commissions. In
1907 was initiated the Play Festival which was promoted by the
Playground Association of Chicago. The festival of 1908,
held in Ogden Park, lasted all day; its three sessions morn-
ing, afternoon, and evening brought into cooperation two
thousand young people and school children of a score of nation-
alities, in national costumes; their games, songs, drills, and
dances drew audiences in excess of twenty-five thousand
persons.
It was about this time, too, that Chicago finally struck its
first full note in response to the ordered beauty of the great
fair of 1893. In 1907 two clubs, the Merchants' and the Com-
mercial, uniting under the name of the latter, took the first steps
toward what became known as the Plan of Chicago a com-
prehensive scheme for the rectification and beautification of the
entire city, with special reference to the neglected frontage
along Lake Michigan. In 1909 the mayor appointed a large
commission of representative citizens to further the idea ; and
in 1911 the elaborate plans and perspective drawings prepared
to illustrate the undertaking the product of skilled artists and
architects and the result of a notable financial outlay were
put on exhibition at the Art Institute. 7 In some aspects they
7 Moody, tVacker's Manual of the Plan of Chicago.
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 43
raised, perhaps, an unattainable ideal; yet a man's reach should
exceed his grasp. The plan gave a rallying point for the gen-
eral aims and ambitions of municipal betterment; and though
conflicting interests and powers, private and official, have inter-
fered with the realization of its major features, encouraging
progress has been made in carrying out some of its minor ones.
In 1910 appeared at Springfield the first and only number
of The Village Magazine, the work of Nicholas Vachel Lind-
say, artist and poet. In picture and in verse the author sought
to awaken the state capital to its artistic delinquencies and to
propel it toward better things; one symptom in the general
movement.
Meanwhile, Chicago just as it stood had become the
beneficiary of another invoker of beauty. In 1904 a wealthy
lumberman, resident in the city, died; and in 1905 the Fergu-
son monument fund of more than a million dollars became avail-
able for the "erection and maintenance of enduring statuary
and monuments ... in the parks, along the boulevards, or
in the public places within the City of Chicago, commemorating
worthy men and women of America or important events in our
history." The annual income from this fund was found to
amount to thirty thousand dollars. The first work of art rea-
lized from it was Lorado Taft's " fountain of the Great
Lakes" in Grant Park. Several years' income has been di-
verted to carry out an elaborate plan for the embellishment of
the Midway Plaisance. A further employment of the fund was
for the erection of a memorial column, with sculptured base, in
one of the city's northwestern parks, designed to mark the
hundredth anniversary of the admission of Illinois into the
union. 8
In 1903 the city's art lovers began to benefit from another
fund. The Scammon lectures, given in annual series at the Art
Institute, were due to the bequest of Mrs. Maria S. Scammon,
who died in 1901. The first series was delivered by John La-
8 Exercises at the dedication of the Ferguson fountain of the Great Lakes.
September 9, 1913.
44 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Farge; others, given by eminent painters, sculptors, and archi-
tects, have continued the series through fifteen years. The Art
Institute, since the days of 1893, has grown architecturally by
the addition of the Ryerson Library, the Fullerton Assembly
Hall, the Blackstone Gallery, and the great central stairway
all being gifts of wealthy art-loving Chicagoans. The comple-
tion of the third of these provided the scene for a gorgeous
"pageant of the Renaissance," and that of the fourth the set-
ting for a picturesque and stirring " masque of Montezuma "
both by an art director whose skillful hand was to be felt in the
various commemorative celebrations held later in Illinois, as a
consequence of the revival of interest in the state's past A
Municipal Art League, organized in Chicago, in 1899, was fol-
lowed a few years later by a city art commission. This, unlike
the state art commission ( 1 909 ) , which is merely advisory, was
given power to veto and has saved the city from more than one
artistic calamity.
In architecture the style of the beaux arts kept its hold, but
a simpler and more monumental manner came into use, par-
ticularly for the multiplying Christian Science churches. A re-
lated style has been preferred for several of the city's railway
stations, built or projected.
During these years, literature in Illinois suffered a lapse.
What had been looked upon as promising a " Chicago school "
went down in eclipse. Instead, there came a prodigious mul-
tiplication of low-grade magazines. Many of these, gay in
name and in color, came to figure prominently on the news
stands; others, stated to have circulation of even greater, of
almost incredible proportions, were never seen in the city which
produced them and were thought to be distributed through the
remoter districts of the middle west and northwest.
Music, during these years, passed through many bright
phases. In 1904, Ravinia Park, some twenty miles from Chi-
cago, on the north shore, was fully under way. Its course has
continued uninterrupted, though there have been times when
"saving Ravinia" became a rather poignant pastime. This
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 45
resort began with symphony concerts by organizations of the
highest grade, whether eastern or western. In later years it
supplemented its orchestral performances with summer opera
cut to the needs of the season. Evanston, also on the north
shore, became, in 1909, the scene of the first Annual North
Shore Festival, an undertaking molded to a large scale and cele-
brated in a large building, the gymnasium of Northwestern
University. Each season has brought a four-day series of per-
formances by a vast orchestra and choruses, together with solo-
ists of distinguished rank, all under Northwestern's musical de-
partment and its experienced head. In 1904 the Thomas Or-
chestra left the Auditorium, after an occupancy of fourteen
years, and took up its quarters in the new Orchestra Hall,
which had been built on Michigan avenue by a general subscrip-
tion. The death of Theodore Thomas followed a few weeks
after the change, but caused no faltering and no deterioration
in the progress and the standards of the orchestra.
During the last decade the great universities of the state
have continued their advances, achieving a broadened cultural
scope and a general financial well-being. These advances have
been evidenced, in a material and physical sense, by a con-
tinuing activity in building: at Urbana, for example, under
President James, the number of buildings was increased from
twenty-four to sixty. But if recent university architecture has
expressed one thing more clearly than another, that thing is the
great development of university life in its social aspects. More
closely than ever have the social interests of the student come
to keep abreast of his scholastic interests: clubs of many kinds
and serving many purposes have been brought into existence;
sport, with its extensive apparatus and expensive parapher-
nalia, has become more exigent in its demands; and the stark,
devoted, barrack-like life of an earlier day has been made to
assume an aspect legendary and incredible. At Urbana frater-
nity and sorority houses have multiplied and have become fac-
tors of increasing importance in the social life of the university
46 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
and the town. At Northwestern, in 1914, the Greek letter soci-
eties entrenched themselves in three quadrangles of fraternity
houses, from which an alliance of alumni and undergraduates
began to exercise a preponderating influence on the conduct of
university affairs. At Illinois, the Woman's Building (1904,
1911) and the Women's Residence Hall (1916-1917) have
risen to demonstrate the urbanities of life to a late and fortu-
nate generation; while, at Chicago, the Ida Noyes Hall, erected
in 19151916, for purposes purely social and recreational,
ranks, in its luxury and splendor, almost as an educational
portent.
A like trend, due allowance made, has been observable in
the state normal schools. Some of these, in the absence of ac-
credited high schools, have, under the township scholarship
law, served practically as schools of that grade, or have organ-
ized academic divisions which serve the same purpose and
which have attracted a large attendance of young men.
At Macomb and De Kalb have recently been erected women's
dormitories of superior character. Thus a thriving social
life has ensued, and the activities of sport and of club life in its
varieties have come to be almost as marked as at the universities
themselves. The relations of the normal schools to the schools
of the towns in which they have been located have tended to
vary with local circumstances. Of course, young children must
be secured for the laboratory method of instructing the teacher
of the future. At Normal itself a town collected round the uni-
versity, and the university soon came to serve in great measure
the educational needs of the community it had created. Macomb
has devised a partial duplication, or overlaying, of the town's
own system the ward in which the normal school is situated
furnishing the elementary pupils required for the student-
teachers. 9 De Kalb has arranged to have all its teaching done
in the city schools themselves, using two schools of the regular
eight-grade type (one in the normal grounds, the other in the
city proper) , where full opportunity has been provided for stu-
8 Military Tract Normal School Quarterly, June, 1917.
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 47
dents to conduct classes under the eyes of critic-teachers. 10 A
scho-j* !.ke that at Macomb, housed in magnificent buildings,
handsomely equipped and swarming with students of all school
ages, is calculated to make the educational beginnings of the
state seem decidedly meager and remote. Far, far away the
days when the few early, intent students at Bloomington, in
cramped and casual quarters bare of equipment, progressed
slowly from candles to kerosene and from kerosene to gas, with
little thought of the Argand burner and none at all of the elec-
tric bulb. 11 Yet the great light has grown, and has illumined
the whole state.
The years since 1900 have witnessed a veritable revolution
in the system of public instruction of the southern counties. This
is evidenced chiefly through the development of high schools.
Among the earliest towns to secure fairly good schools were
Cairo, Mt. Vernon, and Sparta. But the real advance began
with the township high school movement, a growth made prac-
ticable by a better school tax law. Centralia, Harrisburg,
Murphysboro, Marshall, Du Quoin, Benton, Collinsville, Law-
renceville, and Bridgeport are among the towns that have lately
come to rank high as secondary school centers. These schools
are furnishing a higher grade of teachers to the elementary
schools. They are sending more well-qualified students to the
normal school at Carbondale and to the stronger colleges and
universities. They are becoming, more and more, centers for
community betterment, for short courses in agriculture and
home economics, and for public lectures and discussions. They
have stimulated the development of libraries and art collec-
tions and have stirred the city high schools to greater effort for
efficient organization.
In Chicago, the growth of the public school system has gone
on steadily, regardless of notorious controversies in the board of
10 Northern Illinois State Normal School Quarterly, August, 1917.
11 Temporary quarters had been secured for the new institution, by the state
board, in Major's Hall in Bloomington where, on October 5, 1857, the school
opened with a principal, one assistant, and twenty-nine pupils. Cook and
McHugh, History of the Illinois State Normal University, p. 25. For primitive
conditions, including lighting, see ibid., in.
48 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
education. In 1917 the enrollment of pupils had risen beyond
three hundred and sixty thousand and the roster of teachers
beyond eight thousand. 12 There were two hundred and seventy-
four elementary schools besides twenty-eight others, including
five technical high schools; and the immense appropriation for
maintenance has risen to more than fourteen and a half million
dollars. A few years earlier a large free industrial school had
been opened in Pullman.
In recent years the general musical life of the state has made
great advances. Several of the normal schools have estab-
lished bands, orchestras, and choruses. Musical interests have
been strongly active at Jacksonville, where the Illinois Con-
servatory of Music (merged with Illinois College in 1903) and
the Illinois Woman's College (with a music hall erected in
1906) have maintained and advanced their status. Both have
established orchestras and choruses, and performances of the
standard oratorios and cantatas, as well as of operas, serious
or light, have been frequent. And music has naturally been,
always, an important interest at Jacksonville's Illinois School
for the Blind. A notable building for musical uses was erected
at James Millikin University, Decatur, in 1903. Here, as at
Jacksonville, concerts of high quality have been frequent; and
here too, a constant accession of juvenile pupils has fed the
flood of the general stream. At Galesburg the faculty and
students of Knox Conservatory of Music (established in 1883)
have continued the tradition of church and chapel services
marked by a high distinction; and at Lombard College the pre-
dominant interest in the school of three arts has been the musi-
cal interest. Of late years, Eureka, near Peoria, has been the
scene of remarkable musical festivals. Thus, in the spring of
1917, a performance of the " Messiah " was given there with a
chorus of a thousand voices and a director and orchestra from
the music department of the University of Illinois. Illinois
itself, as the result of a liberal gift, has begun the erection of a
12 Generalized from unpublished statistics of the Chicago board of educa-
tion.
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 49
notable building which will mean an era in the history of its
school of music. At Springfield a college of music has been
established and a full high school orchestra organized. The
very active musical life of Peoria has expressed itself in ama-
teur musical clubs and singing societies, in the presence of an
exceptional number of music teachers, and in a musical college
housed in its own building. The rich and genial life of Peoria
has expressed itself further in a variety of social, benevolent,
and protective organizations. Though incorporated as a city
as late as 1845, Peoria was not slow in reaching the rank of
second in the state. Besides having its fair share of turnver-
eins, kindergartens, and maennerchors, it has hospitably domes-
ticated Redmen and Foresters, Elks and Eagles, Knights of
Khorassan, Knights of Pythias, Nobles of the Mystic Shrine,
the Order of the Eastern Star, and similar orders in wide vari-
ety a phase of social life which has been expressed architec-
turally in the Mohammed Temple (1909), a structure elabo-
rately oriental. Peoria, devoted to the lively and bizarre, has
naturally become a favorite meeting-place for conventions and
for social bodies intent on celebrations.
The student of applied culture may reasonably ask not only :
How do you house your students and school children, but what
accommodation do you provide for the stranger within your
gates? Hotels through the middle west have emerged but
lately from the cloud of mediocrity which dimmed so long the
general life of the Mississippi valley. But in recent years hotels
of metropolitan bulk and stature and of corresponding equip-
ment have begun to rise.here and there. Peoria, Decatur, Gales-
burg, Bloomington, and some other points in the cultural life of
the state have lately bestirred themselves to welcome visitors in
hostelries of the approved current type; Springfield too, where
a house long noted as a center for political and social gather-
ings, has lately reconstructed itself on the accepted model of
the day. Far, far back beyond such rotundas, lobbies, and cafes
as these houses afford are felt to be the taverns and eating
houses which met the simpler wants of an earlier time.
50 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
One may inquire further: What have the larger towns of
the state done for the welfare and pleasure of their own citi-
zens? In the matter of public parks much has been accom-
plished here and there. Alton and Peoria have developed park
sites in consonance with natural opportunities a tract of hills
and valleys in the one instance, a stretch of river bluff, with
wide-embracing views, in the other. Springfield has sur-
rounded itself by a complete system of parks; and East St.
Louis at least recognizes in the St. Clair county highlands above
her river bottom a country-side which offers a scenic tour of
high attractiveness. And the state, in 191 1, established a park
commission, one of the objects of which was the conservation
of such natural beauties as those that surround Starved Rock on
the Illinois river.
In 1916 work was begun on the forest preserve of Cook
county. The project, first formed in 1904, had required re-
peated elections (1905, 1910, 1914), before all legal and offi-
cial objections could be removed. 13 However, a favorable opin-
ion handed down by the state supreme court finally cleared the
way; in the spring of 1916 there was a large issue of forest
preserve bonds, and in the autumn of that year were signed
the first contracts for a considerable purchase of wooded acres
lying beyond Chicago's confines. 14
The extensive project for the improvement of the lake
front, in Chicago, was marked for long delays, owing to the
conflicting interests of the various powers involved; but efforts
made more or less independently of these have already resulted
in giving that part of the city an altered physiognomy. In 1916
Chicago opened its new municipal recreation pier which, erected
at a cost of four million dollars, extends into Lake Michigan
for nearly three-quarters of a mile, affords headquarters for
excursion steamers, and has provided concert and dance halls,
restaurants, and the like for the summer holiday throng. A
13 Board of Forest Preserve Commissioners of Cook County, Official Records
of Proceedings; Chicago Tribune, various issues between 1914 and 1917.
14 A vote on a bond issue of sixty million dollars for a system of good
roads throughout the state will be taken November, 1918.
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 51
mile and a half to the south has been constructed (1915-1918)
the new building of the Field Natural History Museum. For
this structure the late Marshall Field bequeathed a sum of eight
million* dollars: it furnishes central quarters for the extensive
collections gathered after the fair of 1893 in the former Art
Building in Jackson Park. Midway between these two great
enterprises the Art Institute has recently extended itself in
Grant park over the railway tracks at the foot of Adams street,
and has become a repository for the paintings purchased from
time to time by the society called the Friends of American Art.
It has also been enriched recently by the Burnham Alcove, a
collection of architectural publications which serves as a memo-
rial of the chief architect of the Columbian exposition. In
1916, the institute, which has maintained the largest art school
in the United States and the most numerously visited of Amer-
ican art museums, began an extension service : lectures, art ex-
hibitions, and demonstrations of interior decoration for peri-
patetic use through the towns of the state and of the middle
west.
The parks of Chicago, if not so large as they ought to be,
have been found large enough for several golf links. Five
courses have been laid out in different parts of the park system,
the links at Jackson Park affording the most extensive example
of municipalized golf in the country. In such of the parks as
front upon Lake Michigan, bathhouses of notable extent and
elaborateness have lately been constructed. Music in the parks
has come to be furnished by the Chicago Band Association;
maintained by a body of private citizens, the band appears in the
various parks in rotation. The Civic Music Association de-
signed to render a like service in the field houses and grounds of
the smaller parks, held its first spring festival in 1915, and has
given annual festival concerts of note. Summer parks of the
White City type have sprung up in numbers. The peculiar
towers and trestles required for the functioning of such enter-
prises have become familiar in many cities and towns, large and
small.
52 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The outstanding feature in the musical life of Chicago, dur-
ing the past decade has been the establishment of opera as a
regular and abiding feature in the city's life. The autumn of
1910 saw the opening of the first season of the Chicago Opera
Association at the Auditorium. This opera, in the breadth and
the detail of its organization, the standing of its principal sing-
ers, the quality of its orchestra and chorus, and the abilities of
its director, has given the Auditorium rank among the really
great opera houses of the world. Besides its regular perform-
ances at home, the company has given performances all the way
from New York to San Francisco. More particularly, its tours
through the middle west, the northwest, and the south have
done much to domesticate opera in the ambitious cities of the
Mississippi valley. Far, far is all this from the simple day
when small troupes of singers from the remote east paused in
passing, for a day or two or passed without pausing at all.
In the drama the corresponding years have been years of
protest. Chicago has been an active center for " new theaters,"
"little theaters," "drama players," "players' workshops,"
" drama leagues " and the whole flux of minor movements pro-
voked by the degraded condition of the stage. Chicago has
even seen a " college theater," devised and directed by a de-
voted little group of Catholic priests who, with wide fluctua-
tions between optimism and despair, endeavored to provide
decent entertainment for their self-respecting parishioners.
The Little Theater, which earned a certain prominence, began
its career in the autumn of 1912. More recently, the the-
ater of Hull House which has maintained a company and has
given varied performances for fifteen years or more, has begun
to speak of itself as the first of " little theaters " as the thing
itself, existing years before the name for the thing came to be
invented.
Many of these small movements toward theatrical reform
have taken on, practically, the form and procedure of clubs.
They may serve to illustrate at once the serviceability, the vari-
ability, and the inevitability of the club idea. Association, once
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 53
made familiar as a force and a method, will not be dispensed
with. A new spirit is certain to produce new forms. Among
clubs recently organized in Chicago for giving body to new im-
pulses may be mentioned: the Cliff-Dwellers, a man's club
formed in 1911 on a new model by practitioners, patrons, and
lovers of the arts; the Women's City Club (1915) engaged,
like the Men's City Club, with civic and municipal questions ; the
Cordon, an organization of professional and business women
with centrally situated quarters; and the Arts Club, an interest-
ing blend of professional artists and of women socially promi-
nent. Some of these organizations, with others like them, have
found place in the Fine Arts Building, an accommodating
assemblage of theaters, studios, recital halls, music schools, and
"art" shops.
Literature, too, goes through its changing phases with the
changing years. About 1912 poetry rose suddenly as a more
vivid factor in American life. In October, of that year, Poetry :
A Magazine of Verse began publication in Chicago and the city
found itself one of the chief foci of the new movement. Poetry
was the earliest, the most radical, and the most aggressive
magazine of a type since become familiar; its object has been
to "exhibit" current verse an analogy drawn, of course,
from the public picture gallery. In 1916 the number of new
poets discovered in Chicago, and of old ones rediscovered, made
the publication of a Chicago Anthology a matter of ease.
The pageant, a commemorative blend of poetry, drama,
history, and wide neighborly cooperation, has been cultivated in
Chicago for the use and delectation of cities east and west, and
also for such towns of Illinois as had felt disposed to materi-
alize a consciousness of their historic past combined with an
essay at the art of the theater. Thus, Belleville, which, in 1 890,
had celebrated the hundredth anniversary of the installation of
Governor St. Clair, observed still more elaborately, in 1914,
the hundredth anniversary of the establishment of the seat of
government for St. Clair county in that town. 15 A pageant of
15 The text of the pageant was published In Belleville. It was by Thomas
54 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
similar nature and directed by the same artists, had been held
in 1912 at Edwardsville, the county seat of Madison county,
with the aid of a contingent from Alton. In the same year Knox
College celebrated its seventy-fifth anniversary by giving a
pageant illustrative of the history of Galesburg and the college
during their joint existence. 16
But pageants are occasional, with the occasions far between ;
and the demand for music and drama is constant and insistent.
Two developments of this latter day meet this demand the
"record" and the film. These, along with the telephone and
the interurban, bring a facile participation in life to dwellers in
the country and put them more nearly on a level than they could
otherwise hope to be, in the matter of diversion, with the people
of the cities. The first moving picture ( in any close approxima-
tion to today's sense of the term) was shown in 1894; in less
than a quarter of a century the invention had been developed
and perfected, the immense mechanism of production and dis-
tribution had been evolved and extended, and the moving pic-
ture, as a source of entertainment and instruction with slight
regard for the infrequent visits of unworthy traveling compa-
nies was to be found in view upon the main street of every
town and village. The rise of the mechanical player has been
equally sudden and its vogue equally great. Everywhere the
eye and the ear, however far from urban centers, may take their
share in the great sweep of life. Far away, indeed, the meager
and monotonous hours of earlier years, when even holidays
might be empty and when winter evenings were long.
Illinois had emerged from the Civil War a commonwealth
lean, forlorn, bedraggled. Mortgages and miasma plagued
the lonely, backward farmer. Eight per cent interest and chills
and fever harassed his unprofitable days. There was no ade-
quate conception of scientific agriculture. The early settlers.
Wood Stevens, of the Carnegie Institute of Technology, Pittsburg, and author
of earlier pageants given at the Art Institute, Chicago.
16 For a complete account of the Galesburg pageant see Webster, Seventy-
five Significant Years. The Story of Knox College, 1837-1912.
EDUCATION, ART, AND LETTERS 55
if New Englanders, had followed the primitive and narrow
methods of their own section ; if southerners, they had been dis-
posed by early training and inclination to hold cereals second-
ary to cotton. The manufacture of farm machinery had only
begun. There was no proper understanding of the state's re-
markable soil; no sense of the possibilities of its low-grade
coals, or of its clays, or of concrete in its manifold forms; no
proper employment of drainage, no proper use of fertilizers.
The isolated husbandman was yet to be told of improved breeds
of cattle and of bettered dairying methods ; yet to learn how to
combat the insect and vegetable pests that assailed him; yet to
be instructed as to what were the most profitable crops and how
he could increase their yield; yet to realize, in short, how a suit-
able type of state university could, in the words of Dr. Draper,
put millions into the farmers' pockets. Modern science and a
real and effective educational engine have done this. A uni-
versity which, from the start, laid a strong emphasis on agri-
culture has had its work supplemented by farmers' institutes,
local experiment stations, and demonstration trains. The ad-
vance of Illinois in general prosperity has been in large part the
advance of the instructed farmer an advance which has made
Illinois the first agricultural state in the union. Its towns, too,
have secured a good share of the general apparatus of amenity:
school buildings and libraries, modern waterworks, well-paved
and well-shaded streets. Prosperity has followed instruction;
and culture in the sense of a fuller, fairer, richer scheme of
living has followed prosperity. But such concrete facts are
simply the convenient exemplifications of those processes, both
complex and comprehensive, and of those results, both widely
diffused and ofttimes imponderable, which have marked the
transition from a past era to the present. Implicit in this prog-
ress have been the ideality of the professor, the devotion of the
pastor, the ready response of the student, and the quick cooper-
ation of the citizen in the march toward better things. And
thus stands Illinois on the threshold of her second century of
statehood.
III. AGRICULTURAL CHANGES
THIRTY years ago the farmers in Illinois, as in many other
parts of the country, were suffering from u hard times."
But since the end of the depression about 1896, the farmers
have enjoyed a prosperity equalled by few other occupational
groups in the state. Yields have been increased, values have
gone up still more rapidly, farming practice has been improved,
and improvements in other lines have made the farm a pleas-
anter and more comfortable place of residence. And yet in
spite of these facts agriculture in Illinois has labored under
many difficulties. As in all progressive enterprises problems of
readjustment and change have presented themselves and
pressed for solution. The one which has probably called forth
the greatest amount of discussion has been the steady with-
drawal of the rural population from the farms and its concen-
tration in the cities. 1
This is not a new movement, but it has gone on with espe-
cial rapidity in the last twenty-five years, during which period
the industrialization of the state and the growth of cities were
offering new opportunities and attractions to the boys and girls
from the farms. As a result the percentage of the total popu-
lation engaged in agriculture fell steadily, although the propor-
tion engaged in all gainful occupations, that is at work for pay,
was as steadily increasing. A century ago nine-tenths of the
people in the state found employment in agriculture and in 1 870
over half; but by 1890 the proportion had fallen to less than
one-third, to only one-fourth in 1900, and to less than one-fifth
in I9io. 2
Not only has there been a decline in the proportion of the
1 See above, p. 4 ff.
2 See table in appendix, p. 493-
56
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 57
population engaged in agriculture from thirty-two per cent in
1890 to nineteen per cent in 1910, but the last census report
actually registered a decrease in the absolute number thus occu-
pied. The explanation of the curious condition that a greater
proportion of the total population was engaged in gainful oc-
cupations in 1910 than in 1890 is doubtless to be found in the
fact that as the population moves from the country to the city
a larger number of persons work for a wage than would be the
case in an agricultural community. The less agricultural a
community becomes the more generally engaged in gainful occu-
pations will its members be. The members of a family who do
not receive money pay for their services are not reckoned in
the census reports as being engaged in gainful pursuits, and this
group is of course much larger in a rural than in an urban
community.
While the number of persons engaged in agriculture was
falling, an equally marked change had been taking place in the
nationalities of the farm population. Ever since the early days
of the pioneers this group has always consisted primarily of
native American stock, but the last quarter century has seen a
steady increase in this element, until today nearly nine-tenths
of the Illinois farmers are native born. Such a movement
merely parallels the steady Americanization of the state popula-
tion as a whole, though in the case of the agricultural popula-
tion it is strengthened by two other factors. 3
In the first place the necessity for a large and ever larger
investment of capital before one can own a farm precludes all
but a small minority of immigrants from joining this group.
And in the second place, as the older foreign born element dies
off and their farms pass to their children who were born in this
country, the latter are recorded among the native born. The
proportion of the native born among the agricultural popula-
tion tends therefore to become constantly greater except in so
far as it may be offset by the accession of new immigrants who
engage in agriculture. 4
3 See p. 22-23. 4 See table in appendix, p. 493.
58 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
In spite of the stationary character of the agricultural popu-
lation, the products, both field and animal, were increased
greatly during this period. If the year 1840 is taken as the
base and the population engaged in agriculture and the pro-
duction of cereals is calculated in terms of this base, the follow-
ing results are obtained:
AGRICULTURAL POPULATION AND PRODUCTION, 1840-1910
YEAR
Population engaged
in agriculture
Production of
cereals, bushels
Increase in cereals over
increase in population
engaged in agri-
culture
1840
IOO.O
IOO.O
1890
4.2 Q. 2
I.CO3.O
I,O7?.8
IQOO. .
43Q.4
I 024.. 6
1,4.8 s. 2
TQIO. .
Ala.*
I 863.2
1.4.34.8
From this it is seen that while the population increased
about four times between 1840 and 1900, the production of
cereals increased almost twenty times. In the decade following
1900, however, there was a slight falling off, due no doubt to
the decline in the agricultural population. The efficiency of the
persons engaged in agriculture had increased very greatly, and
this increase in efficiency may be considered as equivalent to an
increase in the number of agricultural workers.
To what causes shall this tremendous gain in agricultural
production be ascribed? First in importance undoubtedly has
been the changing personnel of the farm population. In place
of the wasteful pioneer, whose extractive methods have already
been outlived, has come the modern business farmer, equipped
with the latest knowledge and improvements. The typical up-
to-date Illinois farmer of the twentieth century has immensely
broadened his outlook and increased his efficiency. It is a truism
that he must be a business man as well as farmer, acquainted
with markets and prices and able to apply a cost accounting sys-
tem to his operations. So rapid is the march of improvements
that he must keep posted also on the latest achievements of
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 59
science and practical experimentation which are brought to him
in farm journals and experiment station bulletins. The younger
generation is receiving ever improved technical education in
high school and college. If proof were needed of the progres-
siveness of the modern Illinois farmer, it may be found in the
improved equipment of the farm home, in the larger use of
farm machinery, of automobiles, of rural telephones, and of
other devices whose use is characteristic of the new farmer.
But from what has just been said it is evident that the
farmer of today is " the heir of all the ages." Science and in-
vention have contributed to equip him with labor-saving devices
and farm machinery which have enormously increased his effi-
ciency and lightened his toil. The value of farm implements on
Illinois farms more than doubled in the twenty years from 1890
to 1910, increasing from $34,456,938 to $73,724,074, and this
increase in total values occurred in spite of a striking decline in
the price of farm machinery. But in spite of this decline the
value of farm machinery to each person engaged in agriculture
was 1.7 times as much in 1910 as it had been in 1860. The
amount of machinery per farm worker trebled in the same inter-
val. In 1910 this state was surpassed only by Iowa and New
York in the value of farm implements.
The distribution of these improved tools and machines is
by no means uniform throughout the state, about forty-four
per cent being found in the northern section and seventeen per
cent in the southern, while the remainder was in the central.
The ratio of the value of machinery per farm in the northern,
central, and southern divisions was about three to two to one.
The explanation of this difference is of course to be found in
the fact that most of the machinery and the most valuable ma-
chinery was found in the corn and wheat belts of the state. As
these had become fairly well established by 1890 subsequent
census reports have indicated very little change in the distribu-
tion of farm machinery throughout the state, although each
census has recorded an increase.
The decrease to the farmer of the cost of farm machinery
60 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
is shown in the following table, which gives the changes between
1860 and 1900:
COST OF FARM MACHINES, 1860-1900 5
ARTICLE 1860 1880' 1890 1895 1900
Cultivators, riding, 2-horse 3
> 45.00
$ 45.00
$ 35-00
$ 28.00
$ 28.00
Drills, grain
90.00
70.00
52.00
48.00
5O.OO
Harrows, spring tooth, i6-tooth
25.00
22.00
1 6.00
I2.0O
7-OO
Harrows, disc
45.00
40.00
30.00
2O.OO
2O.OO
Harvester, combined
150.00
110.00
80.00
65.00
65.00
Planters, corn, single row
20.00
20.00
16.00
I4.OO
I4.0O
Plows, walking
18.00
16.00
15.00
12. OO
12-75
Plows, gang
60.00
60.00
55-00
5O.OO
48.00
Rakes, sulky hay
35.00
25.00
20.00
16.00
I4.OO
Reapers
150.00
75.00
65.00
60.00
6O.OO
Rollers, land or field
35.00
35.00
30.00
25.00
25.00
Seeders, with cultivators
53.00
43.00
38.00
34-00
35-oo
Shellers, corn
8.00
7.00
6.00
5-50
6.00
Mowers
100.00
65.00
60.00
35-oo
40.00
Diggers, potato, plain
18.00
20.00
15.00
12.00
10.00
Total cost of one machine of each
kind
852.00
614.00
533-oo
436.50
434-75
Cost of machinery in per cents, with
1860 as base
IOO.OO
72.00
62.5
51.2
51.0
Value of machinery per farm worker
in per cents, with 1860 as base. .
100.00
135-4
133-4
152.0
170.2
Amount of machinery per farm
worker in per cents, with 1860 as
base
IOO.OO
188.0
213.4
296.8
333-7
The decline in the price of farm machinery seems to have
been arrested about the year 1900, and between that date and
1910 prices remained stationary. Since this last date the in-
crease in the prices of these articles has been very great as a
result of the tremendous fall in the value of the monetary unit.
The extent of the fall in the cost of farm machinery during the
fifty years ending in 1910 may be judged by the fact that in the
latter year $100 would have purchased as much as $180 would
have done in 1860. At the same time there had taken place a
5 Based on Holmes, The Course of Prices of Farm Implements and Machin-
ery, 15-25.
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 61
vast improvement in the efficiency and durability of the ma-
chines that was in inverse proportion to their price.
As a result of this increase in the amount and improvement
in the character of machinery the enhanced efficiency of the
farm population offset the decline in numbers. Another more
indirect result of the introduction of machinery may be noted.
As it took men of ability to run the expensive and complicated
machinery higher demands were made on the character and in-
tellectual capacity of the agricultural population. At the same
time the hard manual toil and drudgery were greatly lessened.
These factors have done much to raise the standards of the
farmers of Illinois.
Some of the more notable changes and improvements in
farm machinery may be noted at this point, in the production
of which Illinois inventors and manufacturers have had full
share. It is not possible to assign credit always to particular
men for the invention of a machine. Ideas were borrowed;
frequently hundreds of patents have been taken out in per-
fecting a single machine, the few successful ones being finally
combined. By 1893 most of the important machines had been
pretty well developed, but improvements are constantly being
made. Those which were of chief importance in the Illinois
corn belt were the following: the improvements on the check
row corn planters and the introduction of the edge-drop selec-
tion of Remels which was made in 1890. Although the edge-
drop system is not now the most popular it had considerable in-
fluence on the development of corn planters. The idea of a
corn binder and harvester is not a new one in this state. " In
the early fifties there might have been seen, in Illinois, a poor
old man, a homeless wanderer, known as ' Father Quincy.' He
had spent his life trying to invent a machine that would cut and
bind cornstalks. He was regarded as a ' crank,' but recent
times have shown that his idea could be realized." 6 Not only
are successful corn binders and harvesters now manufactured,
but they have been introduced into general use in the corn belt.
G Sanford, Story of Agriculture in the United States, 254.
62 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Attempts to produce shockers and shock loaders have not
been so successful. Such devices have been patented and put on
the market; but, while they are a partial success, they have not
yet come into general use. The same thing may be said of corn
pickers and huskers. These machines are still in the experi-
mental stage, although a fairly successful picker has been de-
veloped which works well under favorable conditions.
Other improvements to be noted are the use of hay loaders,
the manure spreader, the modern potato digger and crater, the
wind stacker for grain threshers, grain dumps, and silo-filling
machinery. After they were once put to the test of practical
use, improvements on them were easily made. During the same
period the orchard, garden, and field have been provided with
spraying outfits, and the dairy with such machinery as the Bab-
cock test, the cream separator, and the milker.
Probably the most important improvement which has been
introduced in Illinois agriculture in recent years is the gasoline
tractor. The importance of this machine lies not so much in its
performance up-to-date as in the vast possibilities which it opens
up for the future. The steam engine was first applied to the
work of plowing and threshing, but within the last twenty years
has been pretty generally supplanted by the gasoline engine.
As first developed in the northwest the gasoline tractor was a
large heavy-duty machine, but this failed for plowing under
Illinois conditions. This was followed by the development of
the caterpillar type of gas tractor, and finally by the light gen-
eral purpose tractor. The last named machine has already be-
gun to displace horses on Illinois farms to a noticeable extent.
But the usefulness of the gasoline engine is not limited to the
work of plowing, cultivating, threshing, and drawing loads.
" It has been set to work turning the milk separator, the churn,
the silage cutter, the washing machine, the sausage grinder and
stuffer, the feed and fanning mills, and the grindstone. It
pumps water for the stock, for the house water tank, and for
irrigation; it saws wood, shells corn, digs post holes, and drills
the well. It mows the lawn, and runs the milking machine, the
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 63
vacuum cleaner, and the lathe in the work-shop. By its power
the barn and orchards are sprayed with disinfectant, and the
sheep are sheared. Granaries and silos may be built to any de-
sired height and filled by means of elevators run by gasoline.
Is there any limit to which this engine may not go in relieving
the farmer, his wife, and their helpers from wearying muscular
effort and drudgery?" 7
The tenure of Illinois farms is a matter of growing impor-
tance, for there is an undoubted movement in the direction of
an increase in tenant farming and a withdrawal of owners from
active use of the land they own. 8 It may be too early to speak
with certainty as to the economic and social results of this
change, but as to the tendency itself there seems little doubt.
In 1890 the number of farms in the state operated by tenants
was 81,833 or 34 per cent of all; in 1910 it was 104,379 or 4 1
per cent of all. In the latter year Illinois ranked sixth among
the states of the union in the percentage of tenancy among
white farmers, and third if the proportion of farm acreage
instead of the number of farms be taken as the criterion.
Moreover the average size of tenant farms is steadily grow-
ing larger, and in 1910 they embraced forty-four per cent of the
total farm acreage of the state.
The growth of tenancy is most marked in the corn belt,
Ford county showing the greatest proportion of tenant farms
in 1910, namely sixty-seven per cent of all farms within the
county. Tenancy and specialization in cereal production seem
to have gone hand in hand; in those parts of the state where
the owners largely operate their own farms diversified farm-
ing is most developed. Or to put it another way, ownership has
persisted in those sections where technical knowledge, capital,
and managerial ability find their widest scope in farming, while
in those sections where a highly specialized one-crop system pre-
vails tenancy is most prevalent and competition among renters
7 Sanford, Story of Agriculture in the United States, 259.
8 For a full discussion of this subject see Stewart, Land Tenure in the United
States, with Special Reference to Illinois.
64 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
most severe. 9 Owners tend to be more progressive while the
tenants follow the beaten track.
In the early days the thrifty tenant might normally hope in
time to become an owner and to operate his own farm. But
with the steady increase in land values it has become increas-
ingly difficult for the young man, beginning as a tenant, to pur-
chase land of his own and thus to pass from tenancy as an inter-
mediate stage to ultimate ownership of his farm. 10 This seems
to indicate that tenancy will undoubtedly persist in Illinois agri-
culture as a permanent phenomenon.
The number and size of farms in Illinois is a matter of in-
terest, though of minor importance. The number of farms
grew from 240,681 in 1890 to 264,151 in 1900, a gain of al-
most ten per cent, but in the following decade it fell off again to
251,872, a decline of four and six-tenths per cent. Practically
all the loss in the number of farms was confined to the northern
division where the tendency to consolidation was most marked
and where the growing cities were encroaching on the farm
area. In the southern division, where there was still consider-
able unimproved land, there was an increase in the number of
farms in each decade. It is evident, however, that very little
change in either direction may be expected in this matter in the
future. The number of farms will probably remain very nearly
stationary at the point which they have now reached.
The steady decrease in the average size of Illinois farms
had been interrupted during the eighties so that the acreage in
1890 showed a slight gain over that of the average farm ten
years earlier. During the nineties, the downward tendency was
resumed, but since 1900 the farms have grown larger again
until now the average size is greater than at any time since the
Civil War.
More important than these points, significant though they
are of changes in farming practice in Illinois, are the changes
9 Stewart, Land Tenure in the United States, with Special Reference to Illi-
nois, 8 z.
10 Bogart, " Farm Ownership in the United States," Journal of Political
Economy, 16:201-211.
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 65
which have to do with the utilization of the land as shown in the
yield and in the values, both of the farms and of their products.
The amount of land devoted to agriculture within the state
had declined during the latter eighties and early nineties owing
to the low price of agricultural products as a result of the open-
ing up of the northwest and of the steady fall in the general
price level. But the agricultural depression ended about 1896,
and by 1900 the number of acres in farms reached the highest
point which it has ever attained in the history of the state,
namely 32,794,728 acres. Since then there has been a slight
falling off. Of this land in farms there has been a steady
growth in the percentage which is improved from 84.2 per cent
in 1890 to 86.2 per cent in 1910. This shows a more intensive
utilization of the farm area of the state with each succeeding
decade.
The decades ending in 1890 and in 1910 are the only two in
the history of the state which did not witness an increase in tfie
amount of farm acreage. By 1900 over nine-tenths of the
area of the state was in farms, a record surpassed only by Iowa,
Indiana, and Ohio. The most noticeable change during this
period has been the rapid settling of the land in the southern
division. This is due to the fact that practically all the land
available for farming purposes had been taken up in the north-
ern and central divisions by 1900; but in the southern division,
owing to the rougher character of the land, there was still con-
siderable vacant land which was brought under tillage as the
margin of cultivation was pushed down and it became profit-
able to farm poorer lands.
If the amount of unimproved land in the state be taken
another angle is obtained from which to survey the progress
made. The amount of unimproved land in farms grew from
4,829,217 acres in 1890 to 5,095,509 in 1900. This is the
only decade except that ending in 1 860 during which the amount
of unimproved land in farms increased. In both instances it
probably resulted from putting land in farms faster than it
could be improved. By the end of the next decade, however,
66 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the amount of unimproved land in farms had been brought
down to 4,474,614 acres, which was 13.7 per cent of the total
farm lands in the state, or about one acre in every eight. Thus
on the average Illinois farm of 129.1 acres there would be 17.7
acres of unimproved land, which must appear small when
allowance is made for buildings, pasture, and woodland.
The unimproved lands of the northern division consist
primarily of pasture lands while the unimproved lands in the
other two sections, especially in the southern division, are tim-
bered lands. During the last quarter of a century the southern
division has been clearing off its unimproved land very rapidly.
Today most of the land which yet remains unimproved is to be
found along the Mississippi and Illinois rivers and in the Ozark
ridge, where the bluffs make it impractical to cultivate the land.
The extent to which the timbered land has been improved is
illustrated by the fact that in 1910 the forests of Illinois were
less than two-thirds of what they had been thirty or forty years
before.
Closely connected with the improvement of the farm land
in Illinois is the subject of drainage, for much of the best land
of the state was too wet for the best use until it was tiled and
drained. The use of tile drains and ditches has so greatly in-
creased the value of the land throughout the corn belt of Illinois
that this now ranks as among the highest priced agricultural
land in the United States. The movement for tile drainage
had started in the seventies, and by 1895 there were already
666,669,066 feet of tile drain laid in this state, or twenty-six
feet to each acre of improved land. The subsequent growth
was slow, but by 1915 over 750,000,000 feet of tile had been
laid. 11
While the rate of increase was slow, it was steady; and
moreover the very success of the early movement left less to be
done in subsequent decades. Most of the land which is today
undrained consists of swamps and other difficult or low-priced
lands. In 1916 there were 925,000 acres of swamp land in
11 For table see appendix, p. 493-
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 67
Illinois, considerably less than the number in either of the
neighboring states of Wisconsin or Michigan, though consider-
ably more than in Indiana or Ohio. 12 Less than one per cent
of the tiles laid during this period were laid down in the south-
ern division.
More important for the development of the land resources
of Illinois than the addition of a few thousand acres of
swamp lands is the conservation of the improved land by more
careful utilization and by the use of fertilizers. This state has
never ranked high in the use of commercial fertilizers for the
purposes of restoring the lost elements of the soil. The high-
est rank which Illinois has ever reached among the states of the
union in the amount expended for commercial fertilizers was
twentieth place which she attained in 1880 and 1900; in 1910
she ranked twenty-fourth. The largest annual expenditure for
this purpose recorded for the state was $830,660 spent in 1 899
Practically all this was used on the market gardens in the coun-
ties near Chicago, one-fourth being expended in Cook county
alone.
Although these facts would seem to indicate little interest
in the question of conserving or increasing the fertility of the
soil, the farmers of Illinois have been making rapid strides in
this direction by another method. The men of the Illinois agri-
cultural experiment station have worked out a permanent sys-
tem of soil fertility which is being disseminated among the farm-
ers of the state by means of the farmers' institutes and the
county farm advisory bureaus. 13 Emphasis is laid upon fertili-
zation based upon a thorough knowledge of the soil, but scien-
tific seed selection and careful methods of cultivation are also
urged as necessary conditions to successful farming. 14
Probably in no respect have the changes of the last twenty-
five years been so pronounced as in the value of farm property.
12 " Reclaiming Swamp Lands," Wallace's Farmer, 41:1562.
18 Hopkins, "Illinois System of Permanent Fertility," ibid., 41:218.
14 See Hopkins, The Illinois System of Permanent Fertility. See also Hop-
kins, Ho<w Not to Treat Illinois Soils.
68
THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
This has shown a practically uninterrupted growth from the
first settlement of the state. In 1 890 the farms of Illinois were
worth almost $1,500,000,000, which was an increase of twenty-
five per cent over the previous decade. By 1900 they had in-
creased another third to over $2,000,000,000; but the greatest
increase was that which occurred in the next decade, resulting in
the practical doubling of the value of farm property and bring-
ing the figures up to almost $4,000,000,000 in 1910. In this
regard Illinois holds first rank among the states of the union, a
position it has held since 1890.
The greatest increases in value during this period occurred
in the central division, but the northern division shows the
largest average value per farm. In this respect the southern
division, as usual, makes a rather poor showing when compared
with the other two. The census statistics for 1910 show a
great concentration of farm values in the corn belt. A some-
what clearer picture of the changes here suggested may be
secured by taking the average values per farm of the different
species of farm property rather than the total values. These
are presented in the following table:
VALUE OF FARM PROPERTY IN ILLINOIS, 1890-1910
VPAV
Average value
per farm of
Farm property
Land and building;
Implements
Livestock
1890
$6,14.0
$5.247
$143
$7 CQ
IQOO. .
7,<;88
6,684
1 7O
IOIC. .
1C., co?
1^,986
293
1,226
YEAR
Average value of all farm property
Northern division
Central division
Southern division
l8qo. . .
$ 8,068
10, 66 1
20,720
$ 6,909
9,375
19,357
$2,845
3,413
6,121
I OOO
IQIO. .
AGRICULTURAL CHANGES 69
The figures of average values per farm show very clearly
that the land and buildings were by far the most important
element in making for the great increase in values which were
characteristic of farm property in general. By 1910 the land
and buildings made up over nine-tenths of the total value. Be-
side this the value of the farm implements and machinery and
of the livestock appear quite insignificant, although they too
have made notable increases in value during this period.
If the value of the land and buildings be analyzed into its
two component parts, it is further evident that the value of the
land is much the more important of the two. The value of farm
buildings was first reported separately in the census of 1900,
when it was found that the value of the buildings was 14.2 per
cent and that of the land was 85.8 per cent of their combined
value. The next census showed a decline even in this small
proportion contributed by the buildings. Almost half of the
value of the farm buildings is to be found in the northern di-
vision, due in part to the higher standard for farmhouses in
that region and in part to the larger number of farm buildings
necessitated by the development of the dairy cattle industry.
The increase in land values was particularly marked in the
central division and in the corn belt, while it was relatively un-
important in the southern division. Indeed, the farm land in
three of th'e counties in the corn belt, McLean, Livingston, and
Champaign, was worth as much as the farm land of the whole
southern division. In the northern two-thirds of the state, the
land and buildings make up the chief element in the investment
of an Illinois farmer. The average value of an Illinois farm in
1910 was $15,505, but for the northern division it was $20,720
and only slightly less for an average farm in the central division.
It is evident, therefore, that the average farmer in this state is
considerable of a capitalist.
The tremendous increase in the value of farm property dur-
ing the past two or three decades reflects in a striking manner
the changes which have occurred during this period in Illinois
agriculture. Not only has the yield been increased by means
7 o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of improved methods and farm machinery, but an even greater
increase has taken place in the prices which these products com-
manded in the market place. By the beginning of the twentieth
century the growth of the population in the United States had
caught up with the supply of foodstuffs, and there was no longer
an overproduction to depress prices. At the same time there
was a general rise in the price level due to increased gold pro-
duction and expansion of banking facilities. Both these factors
have been immensely exaggerated since the outbreak of the
European war.
This rise in the value of farm products has been reflected
in the value of the farms, which has gone up correspondingly
and in some cases even more rapidly as the future has been
discounted. The enhanced value of the land marks a change
too in agricultural practice, in that the operators, especially if
recent purchasers or tenants, have been forced to utilize the
land as intensively as possible. This has meant in general that
they have been compelled to devote more attention to field crops
and less to animal products, and within the category of field
crops it has been necessary to shift from hay and pasture to
cereal production. Thus the value of farm products in Illinois
increased from an annual average of $185,891,872 for the
five years 1895-1899 to $276,924,048 for the period 1910-
1914, and the proportion made up of field crops grew from
69.8 per cent to 76.2 per cent for the same years. 15
This displacement of the animal products by the field crops
was more marked in the northern and central divisions than it
was in the southern. In general the broad lines of distinction
between the different sections of the state were now being
drawn : mixed farming in the northern division, grain farming
in the central division, cattle raising and the production of
horticultural and other special products for which it is partic-
ularly adapted in the southern division.
15 For table see appendix, p. 494-
IV. PRODUCTS OF THE FARM
THE real value of the farms to the people of Illinois is not
measured by statistics of number, size, or price, but rather
by the yield in agricultural products. Here is the test of the
efficiency of the labor, the machinery, the science, and the effort
which has been applied to the soil. Tried by this standard
Illinois responds nobly. The aggregate value of all farm
products in 1910 was $586,517,053, and by 1917 the value of
the farm products and livestock was estimated by the Illinois
department of agriculture at $956,593,062.* Still more im-
pressive are the statistics of amount, comprising as they do for
the latter date 320,000,000 gallons of milk, 46,600,000 pounds
of butter, 4,000,000 pounds of wool, 100,000,000 dozen eggs,
30,600,000 fowls, 1,000,000 cattle, 3,745,000 swine, 580,-
000,000 bushels of cereals, 4,300,000 tons of hay and forage,
13,000,000 bushels of potatoes, 13,600,000 quarts of small
fruits, 5,000,000 bushels of orchard fruits, and numerous other
smaller items. Here is enough literally to subsist an army,
even of modern proportions.
Farm products may be classified into the two large divisions
of field crops and animal products, and the field crops may
again be divided into the four main groups of cereals, hay and
pasture, horticultural, and miscellaneous. Taken as a whole
the average annual value of the field crops grew from $129,-
890,293 for the period 1895-1899 to $518,227,210 for 1915-
1917. About half of these values were to be found in the
northern division. Of the four groups of field crops the
cereals were not only the most important throughout this
1 Statistical Report of the Illinois Department of Agriculture, December t,
I 9 I 7> P- 32- Allowance has been made by the writer for the understatement by
the state board of equalization of certain items.
7'
72 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
period, but gained steadily in relative importance, making up
about two-thirds of all at the beginning and over three-quarters
at the en'd. This growth was attended by a corresponding
relative decline in the other three groups. 2 The value of the
cereal crops practically doubled in the fifteen years ending in
1909, increasing from $87,005,534 to $170,880,272. The
next half decade saw a slight decline, but the three years end-
ing in 1917 saw these values again more than doubled, the
average reaching the high record figure of $399,226,501.
Of the six main cereal crops, corn is facile princeps, and
moreover its primacy among the cereals has been steadily
growing. From sixty-five per cent of all the cereals in 1895
1899 it steadily grew in relative importance until in 1910-
1914 it made up seventy-one per cent, but fell again to sixty-six
per cent in 1917. This increased concentration upon corn
meant, of course, a corresponding decline in the other cereal
crops and, with the single exception of barley, their relative
importance fell during this period. The greatest concentra-
tion is to be found in the central division where over three-
quarters of the cereal crops, as measured by their values,'
consist of corn. If the number of bushels were taken as the
measure the superiority of corn would be still more marked. 3
Illinois has ranked as the leading state in the union in the
production of corn since 1860, with the single exception of the
census year 1890, when Iowa took first place. The concentra-
tion of this crop within a comparatively limited area is shown
by the fact that since 1870 these two states together have pro-
duced over one-fourth of the corn raised in the United States.
The production of corn in Illinois increased during the nineties,
the acreage planted in corn reaching the high water mark of
8,199,031 acres in 1902, which yielded the largest crop in the
history of the state, namely 320,977,301 bushels. Between
that date and 1914 there was a steady decline both in the acre-
2 For table see appendix, p. 494.
3 For the changes which have occurred in the relative importance of the six
main cereal crops see table in appendix, p. 494-
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 73
age and in the yield. That this was not an accidental result
due to poor crops may be seen from the quinquennial averages. 4
The year 1917 has, however, established a new record of acre-
age planted namely, 9,725,133 acres and of yield, which
was 365,654,400 bushels.
Since 1914 there has been a great increase in the acreage
planted in corn and in the corresponding yield due to the stim-
ulus of high prices as a result of the European war and of the
inflation of our money supply. Nine-tenths of the corn crop
is raised in the northern and central divisions, though the cen-
tral division has in recent years been gaining somewhat at the
expense of both the other two.
While most of the corn is fed to stock, a considerable pro-
portion is utilized as food for man in the form of meal, hominy,
breakfast foods, and other products. Some has also been used
in the manufacture of distilled liquors and alcohol. Numer-
ous experiments have been made to utilize corn stalks for com-
mercial purposes, in recent years with considerable success.
Some years ago the following list of products was made in
Illinois from corn stalks on a commercial scale: 5 cellulose for
packing cofferdams of battleships which prevent them from
sinking when pierced by balls or shells; pyroxylin varnish, a
liquid form of cellulose, the uses of which are practically unlim-
ited; cellulose used for nitrating purposes for making smoke-
less powder and other high explosives; cellulose for packing;
paper pulp and various forms of paper made therefrom; stock
food; mixed feeds for stock; and poultry foods.
As might be expected in a state whose corn crop is so impor-
tant the greatest attention has been paid in Illinois to the im-
provement of the varieties of corn and the selection of those
best suited to the different sections of the state. There has
gone on a continuous process of experimentation, selection, and
adaptation to the needs of Illinois farmers. It may safely be
asserted that the greatest contribution in corn production dur-
4 For table see appendix, p. 495-
8 Myrick, A Revolution in Agriculture, 6.
74 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ing the past twenty-five years has been the more scientific selec-
tion of seeds and the determination of standards. While it
has been found difficult in practice to fix standards, continued
seed selection has gradually developed certain varieties which
seem to owe their superiority to transmissible qualities rather
than to transient environmental effects. It is this continued
selection which has brought Reid's Yellow Dent, to name only
one variety, to its present state of perfection.
The most striking change which has occurred in the cereal
crops in the last twenty-five years has been the great decline
in the importance of wheat. Whereas this crop made up 15.2
per cent of all the cereals raised during the half decade 1890
1894, this proportion had fallen to 8.76 per cent for 1910
1914. The decline in the production of wheat, which had
begun to show itself in the eighties, became more marked as
time went on. In 1880 Illinois had ranked first in the union
as a producer of wheat, but by 1890 had fallen to third place
and in 1900 to fourteenth. Wheat growing has always been
more or less of a pioneer industry, and the center of wheat
production was moving steadily westward during this period.
The decline was not quite so marked in the case of winter
wheat as it was in the case of spring wheat. 6
About half of the total crop is raised in the central division
and most of the rest in the southern division. The
counties in those sections bordering on the Mississippi and
Illinois rivers produce most of the winter wheat, though there
has recently been a great increase in some of the counties in
the southern division bordering on the Wabash river. Spring
wheat is relatively insignificant in comparison with winter
wheat. Most of it is raised in the northern division. The
farmers of Illinois in general have found corn a more profit-
able crop or have been forced to turn from the production of
wheat to diversified farming and especially to give more atten-
tion to dairying. 7
6 For table see appendix, p. 495.
7 For table see appendix, p. 495.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 75
The production of oats showed a steady decline after 1900.
In that year the largest acreage yet planted in oats in the his-
tory of the state was reported, namely 4,065,200 acres, giving
a banner crop of 164,909,129 bushels. After that there was
a fairly steady decline both in acreage and yield to 1914.
Since the outbreak of the European war, however, there has
again been an increase in the attention given to this crop. The
record of 1917, with 5,268,713 acres planted and a crop of
239,587,886 bushels, is not likely to be exceeded even under the
stimulus of war prices. About two-thirds of the oats produced
in Illinois are raised in the northern division. 8
Although Illinois long ranked as the foremost rye pro-
ducing state in the union and now is only slightly surpassed
by Wisconsin, and also ranks first as a producer of barley,
the yield of both these crops is small. Buckwheat has almost
disappeared from view. All these minor cereal crops are
concentrated in the northern division. 9
Far behind the cereals in value and importance comes the
second large group of field crops, namely the forage crops.
The value of these crops remained on a fairly constant level;
but this was due to a great increase in price, for the actual pro-
duction fell off markedly during this period. There was a
steady though a regular decline in the production of hay, the
smallest yield being reached in 1914 when it was only 1,492,180
tons. This is the smallest yield with one exception in the his-
tory of the state. Since then, however, there has been a marked
increase.
What was true of hay has also been true of the amount of
land devoted to pastures. The smallest acreage ever devoted
to this purpose in the history of the state was reached in the
year 1914, but as in the case of hay the period since 1914 has
seen a great increase. These fluctuations are, of course, due
to the steady decline throughout this period of the cattle raising
industry. Its recent revival is connected with the recent great
8 For table see appendix, p. 496.
8 For table see appendix, p. 496.
76 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
demand for hay as a result of the increased prices of livestock.
More than half of the hay produced in the state is raised in the
northern division, and most of this in the fifteen northernmost
counties of the state. The pastures are more widely distrib-
uted, but here too the northern division contains over half of
the pasture lands. In both groups of the forage crops, the
southern division falls far behind the other two in impor-
tance. 10
The horticultural crops constitute the third group of field
crops and comprise vegetables, orchard and bush fruits, and
vineyard products. Of these, vegetables far surpass the other
three groups in importance. The reports of the Illinois state
board of agriculture furnish detailed statistics for only four
kinds of vegetables, namely Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes,
turnips and other root crops, and watermelons. The addition
of this last named fruit within the past twenty years is inter-
esting as showing the possibility of its future development, for
it is not yet important. Irish potatoes make up over nine-
tenths in value of all the vegetables, while sweet potatoes
ranked second in importance at the beginning of the period,
although they were overtaken by the other root crops at the
end of the period. The production of all of them fell off until
1914, since which time more attention has been paid to their
cultivation.
idf*^
In addition to the vegetables enumerated increasing atten-
tion has been paid to market gardening and the production of
small vegetables. The chief of these, arranged in order of
importance according to their acreage in 1910, are the follow-
ing: sweet corn, watermelons, tomatoes, cabbages, onions,
cucumbers, green peas, asparagus, muskmelons, popcorn, green
beans, turnips, rhubarb, celery, carrots, beets, lettuce, cauli-
flower, spinach, radishes, parsnips, pumpkins, squash, and egg-
plant. The aggregate value of these vegetables increased
from $5,304,903 in 1899 to $9,392,296 in 1909. Their pro-
duction was concentrated for the most part in districts tributary
10 For table see appendix, p. 497.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 77
to the large cities and was accordingly centralized in Cook,
Vermilion, Union, St. Clair, and McHenry counties.
The orchard fruits in Illinois consist primarily f apples,
peaches, and pears, of which the first mentioned has always
been by far the most important. There has recently, however,
been an increase in the production of the other two which has
somewhat shaken the supremacy of apples. In the northern
and central divisions the orchards produce little except apples,
but in the southern division there is a considerable development
of peach growing, and latterly of pears.
The leading varieties of apples in Illinois in 1915 were as
follows: Ben Davis (37.8 per cent of all the apples raised),
Jonathan (9.3 per cent), Winesap (5.6 per cent), Grimes
Golden (4.9 per cent), and Rome Beauty and Gano (3.8 per
cent each). 11 It is interesting to note that Illinois' favorite
is a native of the state, having been developed in Hancock
county. Illinois apples are of the very highest quality and
scored the very highest marks at the International exposition
at Paris in 1900. They were awarded fifteen first prize gold
medals, four silver medals, four honorable mentions, and a
grand prize for one of the best continuous exhibits during the
entire exposition. This last honor was especially noteworthy
as only three of the twenty competing states were awarded
grand prizes. 12
Within the last two decades other fruits have become suffi-
ciently important to be separately enumerated by the census.
These are cherries, plums, prunes, quinces, and apricots.
There has been a steady decline in the yield and value of bush
fruits and berries. The census enumerates the production of
strawberries, blackberries, dewberries, raspberries, loganber-
ries, currants, gooseberries, and cranberries. With the single
exception of the last named, in the case of which the acreage
increased from one to ten acres between 1899 and 1909, there
11 Yearbook of the United States Department of Agriculture, 1915, p. 488-489.
12 Transactions of the Illinois State Horticultural Society, new series, 34: 158-
159.
7 8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
was a decline in every one. A similar decline must be recorded
for vineyard products, though curiously enough the same period
witnessed a slight increase in the amount of wine produced.
The fourth group of the field crops enumerated above com-
prises a miscellaneous group consisting of tobacco, broom corn,
textile crops, saccharose crops, grass seeds, and legumes. As
a class this group has been declining in importance in the last
twenty years.
It is evident from this brief survey of the field crops of
Illinois that there has been a growing concentration upon the
cereal crops at the expense of the other three groups, and
within the group of cereals corn has made up a steadily increas-
ing proportion of the whole. The process of specialization,
which is characteristic of manufacturing and of professional
service, is also a marked feature of Illinois agriculture.
Within the corn belt of this state there has been developed a
specialized kind of farming which has called into being a com-
plete apparatus of improved machinery and has resulted in
an enormous production of America's most typical grain.
Not only has the production of corn encroached relatively
upon the other cereals and field crops, but it has also tended
to make the group of field crops more important at each suc-
cessive period than the animal products. The order of nature
seems to have been reversed and the corn devours even the
cattle.
The animal products, the second of the two large groups
into which the products of the farm may be divided, comprise
animals sold, dairy products, poultry, wool, and honey. This
group, taken as a whole, has remained fairly steady except for
a temporary increase during the half decade 19001904 and
again in 19151917. The relative importance of the several
items constituting this group has, however, varied consider-
ably. 13
The animals sold have declined in relative importance
from about two-thirds to a little over one-half of the total
13 For table see appendix, p. 4-97-
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 79
value of this group. Wool and honey have also fallen off.
On the other hand dairy products and poultry have shown
gains. About three-fifths of the animal products are raised
in the northern division of the state, especially in the north-
eastern corner where there is a high degree of concentration
owing to the development there of the dairying and cattle
raising industries.
Before proceeding to a more detailed consideration of the
separate kinds of animal products and especially of the first
item animals sold it will be necessary to note the total
amount of livestock on Illinois farms during this period. 14 In
1890 this state ranked second among the states of the union,
being surpassed only by Iowa, but in 1900 Texas pushed
into second place so that Illinois now ranks third in this
respect.
The census figures of the value of livestock in Illinois dur-
ing the two decades from 1890 to 1910 give a rather mislead-
ing impression as to the changes which occurred during that
period, since they seem to indicate a great growth in numbers.
The aggregate value of all livestock in Illinois increased from
$180,431,662 in 1890 to $308,804,431 in 1910, while the aver-
age value per farm grew from $750 to $1,226. A more accu-
rate picture of the changes that have occurred in this regard in
Illinois will be obtained by taking the actual numbers of the
different kinds of animals rather than the values. For this
purpose the livestock may be divided into the four main groups
of draft animals, dairy animals, meat animals, and other
minor animals.
Horses were the most important animals in the first group.
In 1890 Illinois with 1,335,289 ranked first among the states
of the union as to the number of horses on its farms, but since
1900 it has been outranked by Iowa. Horses are still used in
Illinois almost exclusively for draft purposes and not for breed-
ing so that they have always been found where farm operations
have been most active. Consequently they are most numerous
14 For table see appendix, p. 498.
8o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
in the central division. In 1910 there were 1,452,887 horses
reported on Illinois farms.
Considerable has, however, been done toward improving
the breeds of draft horses by the introduction of pure bred
stallions. From the data given in the various stud books the
distribution of registered pure bred stallions can be ascer-
tained. These show a truly astonishing growth in the number
of owners from 488 in 1890 to 3,179 in 1915, most of the
increase having taken place among the Percherons. This
breed was far and away the favorite at the end of this period,
their number having increased from 152 to 2,280 during the
twenty years. Shire horses were second in popularity and
Belgians third. The Clydesdale were the only ones whose
numbers fell off. The distribution of the pure bred horses
was much the same in 1915 as it had been in 1 890, being about
evenly divided between the northern and central divisions with
a very small fraction in the southern division. McLean county
led in the number of pure bred Percherons, Champaign was
the leading county for Shire horses, Livingston for Belgians,
and Stark for Clydesdales.
In contrast with the distribution of horses, most of which
were to be found in northern section, stands the greater use
of mules and oxen in the southern half of the state. 15 The
relative importance of mules as compared with horses and the
difference between the different divisions may be seen from the
fact that in the northern division on the average farm the ratio
of horses to mules was 37 to i, while in the central division it
was 10 to i, and in the southern only 3 to I. Oxen had grown
so unimportant by 1900 that they were no longer enumerated
separately by the census.
Dairy cows, which had shown a very steady growth in the
state down to 1890, have barely held their own since that date.
The total number of dairy cows has fallen from 1,087,886 in
1890 to 1,057,000 in 1918, so that Illinois, which had previ-
ously ranked third in this respect among states of the union, has
10 For table see appendix, p. 498.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 81
now fallen to fifth place, being surpassed by Iowa, Wisconsin,
New York, and Minnesota. The greatest decline took place
in the central division. Today there is a decided concentration
of the dairy business in the northern tier of counties, especially
in the vicinity of Chicago, with a secondary concentration in the
region opposite St. Louis. This concentration in the northern
division is illustrated by the fact that there the average farmer
has over three times as many dairy cows as the average farmer
in the central division and over four times as many as the
average farmer in the southern division. The concentration
of this industry in the vicinity of our larger cities is of course
due to the increasing demand for whole milk on the part of the
urban population. The growth of the dairy industry in the
other districts is due to the increase in the milk condensing
industry and also to the butter industry in those regions.
Considerable attention has been given in Illinois to the
improvement of the breeds of cattle. The two most popular
breeds have been the Holstein and the Jersey cows, but within
the last twenty-five years the second of these has passed the
former in popularity. In 1890 there were in the state 368
herds led by at least one pure bred registered animal; but by
1915 this figure had been almost doubled, reaching 696. The
Jersey herds had increased from 234 to 300, but the Holsteins
had grown from 115 to 332. Far behind these two in popu-
larity came the Gurnsey with 19 herds in 1890 and 64 in 1910.
Almost half of the registered herds were to be found in the
northern division, though the disparity in this regard has been
gradually declining as better breeds have been introduced into
other sections of the state.
All other cattle, that is all neat cattle except milch cows,
calves, and oxen, are grouped together by the census report
under the heading " other cattle." Beef cattle constitute most
of this group. In the production of these animals Illinois has
been steadily losing ground. Whereas in 1870 Illinois was
surpassed only by Texas in the number of beef cattle, in 1910
it was outranked by Texas, Iowa, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska,
82 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
California, and Oklahoma. The cattle industry has always
been a frontier industry in the United States, and the same
movement which pushed the industry from Ohio to Illinois has
now moved it out beyond the Mississippi river. This is, of
course, a perfectly natural development with the growth in the
value of farm lands in this state, and their more intensive uti-
lization for cereal production. From 1,968,654 cattle in 1890
the number sank to 1,066,275 ' m I 9 IO > but has since risen
slightly to 1,314,000 in 1918. The great decline of the cattle
feeding business is perhaps most clearly shown by the fact that
in 1910 the average farmer in the state had only about half as
many cattle per farm as he did in 1890. The cattle were
pretty well concentrated in the northwestern third of the state. 16
About the beginning of this period cattle feeding in Illinois
and other states in the corn belt entered upon the second stage
of its development. The first stage had been that of feeding
cattle as containers for corn, as this was the cheapest way in
which to market the corn. In the second stage the purpose
was not so much to market corn as to make good beef. Agri-
cultural experiment stations had been working on this problem
for several years. They pointed out that the younger and
smaller an animal is the less will be the grain required to- sustain
the life-giving forces, or to run the machine, and the greater
proportion will go to the building up of body tissue. More
profit could, therefore, be obtained by feeding young animals
than by purchasing and fattening two or three-year-old steers.
This had been worked out experimentally by Professor G. E.
Morrow of the University of Illinois as early as iSyS. 17 But
the farmers of Illinois at this time were not yet convinced of
the practical value of this idea and preferred to get rid of
their cattle and turn the pastures into cornland. By so doing
they saved themselves the expense of costly barns, sheds, and
fences which were required in raising cattle. 18
16 For table see appendix, p. 499.
17 Sanders, Story of the Herefords, 371-380 .
18 Farley, History of the Beef Cattle Industry in Illinois, 13-15.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 83
The decline in the beef cattle industry since 1895 has been
the result of many causes, of which the disappearance of the
free range has been the most important. Investigations at the
Illinois agricultural experiment station in 1902 showed that of
509 men in Illinois engaged in preparing cattle for market, 53
per cent were merely feeders, 35 per cent raised a few of their
cattle and bought the rest, while only 12 per cent earned all
their cattle from birth to maturity. 19 In other words, the Illi-
nois farmer depended for his profit upon the difference between
the purchase price of lean cattle and the sale price of fat cattle.
But it was becoming more difficult to obtain western cattle as
a result of the rapid settlement of the west and the partition
of the ranges into farms. It became necessary for the western
cattle raisers to buy or rent land instead of using the free
ranges of the public domain and this, of course, forced up the
price of cattle, leaving little profit for the Illinois cattle feeders.
Other contributary causes in the decline of the cattle feed-
ing industry were the replacement of livestock production
by more intensive crop cultivation, the increase of tenancy, and
the effect of unwarranted fluctuations in the prices offered by
the packers. 20 None of these, however, is in itself sufficient to
explain the changes that were taking place and certainly none
is as important as the factor just described.
The third stage in the development of beef production in
Illinois has now been definitely entered upon. This is the
production of "baby beef." A great impetus was given this
industry by the high prices which were being paid for beef.
The average age of cattle sold in Illinois in 1914 was two and
one-half years, which is nearly two years younger than the
average had been in 1895, the reason for the decline being the
large number of baby beef cattle which were sold at the age of
from fifteen to eighteen months. If Illinois farmers were to
profit by the high prices to be obtained from beef production
19 Mumford and Hall, Present Methods of Beef Production, circular 88, p. i.
20 Farley, History of the Beef Cattle Industry in Illinois, 13-15; Breeders'
Gazette, 64: 1 8.
84 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
it was evident that they must raise their own cattle, for the
prices of western feeders were reaching prohibitive heights.
That Illinois is well suited to this industry seems proved by
an investigation made by the United States department of agri-
culture on this subject. 21 From this it appears that both the
gross and net cost of producing a baby beef animal during the
years 1914 and 1915 was less in Illinois than in Iowa,
Nebraska, or Kansas, though not so low as in Missouri.
The number of beef cattle sold from Illinois farms declined
very rapidly and very materially in the period between 1900
and 1914, but owing to the great increase in the price of beef
there was an actual increase in the values. It is too early to
determine whether the decline in the production of beef cattle
in Illinois will be arrested by the development of the baby beef
industry, but it is clear that if beef production is to continue
as one of Illinois' industries it must be along these lines. Dur-
ing the past twenty years, the cattle feeding industry has shifted
more and more to the northward, the chief center of the indus-
try being found in McHenry and the adjoining counties. 22
Although Illinois still ranks second in the production of
hogs, being surpassed only by Iowa, there has been a very
decided decline in this industry also since 1890. In that year
the census recorded the largest number of swine ever enumer-
ated within this state, namely 5,924,818; by 1910 the number
had fallen to 4,686,362, but by 1918 had risen slightly to
5,111,000. This reduction was quite uniform throughout
the state. The extent of the decline may be measured by the
fact that whereas in 1890 the average farmer in the state had
twenty-five hogs, in 1910 he had only about nineteen. 23
There is a considerable and growing concentration of the hog
raising industry in the territory between the Illinois, Missis-
sippi, and Rock rivers. The explanation of the decline in the
hog raising industry is undoubtedly to be found in the falling
21 Meat Situation in the United States, part 3, p. 62.
22 For table see appendix, p. 499.
23 For table see appendix, p. 499.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 85
off of the beef industry, for hogs are generally raised in con-
nection with cattle, following them as they feed. As has just
been stated, the raising and fattening of beef cattle is a declin-
ing industry in Illinois; and its decline has adversely affected
the swine industry also.
In spite of the reduction in the numbers of hogs within the
state there has been no diminution in the interest taken in the
improvement of breeding. The number of breeders of pure
bred swine in the state in 1880 was 518, but by 1916 this
number had grown to 1,329. In the eighties the Berkshires
had represented about 60 per cent of the pure bred swine, but
by 1916 there had been a considerable change. In this year
the leading breeds of hogs that appeared on the Chicago mar-
ket made up the following estimated per cents: Duroc-
Jersey, 33 percent; Poland-China, 30 per cent; Chester White,
25 per cent; Hampshire, 8 per cent; Berkshire, 2 per cent;
Tamworth and Yorkshire, i per cent each. This estimate may
be accepted as typical for Illinois since the conditions in the
neighboring states which market their hogs in Chicago are
similar to those prevailing here.
The hiterest taken in the question of improving breeds of
swine by Illinois men is indicated by the fact that they con-
stituted twelve per cent of the membership of the pure bred
swine associations in America. This is a larger ratio than that
of the number of swine in Illinois to the total number in the
whole country.
The decline in the number of sheep which began about 1865
continued without interruption until the end of the century. 24
Between 1900 and 1910, however, there was a slight gain.
But Illinois remains relatively unimportant as a sheep raising
state. The average number of sheep per farm declined in the
period 18901910, from 3.8 to 2.6; this is a smaller number
than that of any other domestic animal. A study of the dis-
tribution of the sheep shows a very distinct sheep belt which
lies within a district formed by drawing the northern boundary
24 For table see appendix, p. 500.
between Hancock county on the west and Clark on the east
and the southern boundary by drawing a line from Pike on the
west to White on the east. While the number of sheep in the
state as a whole declined materially between 1890 and 1910,
the number of those within this belt showed a slight gain.
Although there has been a decline in the absolute number
of sheep there has been a very great increase in the number
of pure bred flocks, that is to say flocks that were led by at
least one animal that was registered in the flock books of the
different breeds. Between 1890 and 1916 the number of pure
bred Shropshire flocks had increased from 38 to 272. There
was a decided concentration of this breed in Crawford and
the neighboring counties. Other breeds showed nothing like
so great an increase. The Oxford Down flocks grew only from
30 to 44, the Hampshires from 2 to 15, and the Merinos from
i to 6, while the Southdowns showed an actual decrease from
1 6 to ii.
The decline in the production and sale of mutton, which
began in the eighties, has continued without interruption ever
since. It has been an unprofitable industry throughout the
whole of this period, because corn and pasture have been worth
more for other purposes than feeding sheep, which could be
raised more cheaply in other states or parts of the world.
The dairy industry presents a different picture, for here the
record has been one of steady increase. But while this is true
of the industry as a whole, there has been a considerable shift-
ing within the group, the amounts of milk, butter, and cheese
showing a falling off, while that of cream increased. 25 On the
basis of value, about three-quarters of the dairy products con-
sist of milk; about a tenth each of butter and cream; and less
than one per cent of cheese. The milk industry is largely con-
centrated in the northern division and that of butter and cream
in the central, although the last few years have seen a consider-
able increase in the growth of creameries in the southern
division.
25 For table see appendix, p. 500.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 87
The milk industry is altogether the most important branch
of dairying in Illinois, but in spite of the growth of population
the sales of whole milk have shown almost an uninterrupted
decline from an annual average of 1 12,584,707 gallons for the
period 1895-1899 to 81,396,353 for 1917. The reason for
this is, as has already been pointed out, the introduction of
separators on the farms, by the use of which the farmer was
enabled to sell the cream instead of the whole milk and thereby
save considerable expense in haulage. That this is the ex-
planation rather than a lessened production of milk is shown
by the statistics of milch cows, the number of which has re-
mained fairly stationary during the last twenty years at slightly
over one million animals. Two-thirds of these, as might be
expected, are to be found in the northern division, the average
farmer there having about three times as many as the average
farmer in the central division and four times as many as the
average farmer in the southern division.
The general use of the cream separator and of the Babcock
milk test, according to which the farmer's milk and cream are
now paid for according to quality rather than quantity, that is
according to the amount of butterfat in them, has forced the
farmer to pay more attention to the breeding of better grades
of stock.
While the amount of milk sold in the state as a whole has
fallen from an annual average of 112,584,707 gallons for the
period 1895-1899 to 90,355,728 gallons for 1915-1917, the
city markets have shown a steady increase. For instance the
average daily milk supply of Chicago rose from 476,992 quarts
in 1898 to 772,800 in 1901 ; by 1916 it was 1,100,000 quarts. 26
Part of this growth was due to the demand by milk condensing
and oleomargarine factories, but most of it is attributable to
the normal demand of an expanding urban population for
whole milk for table consumption, which moreover has in-
creased slightly during this period.
The production of butter has been steadily transferred
26 Information supplied by the Chicago board of health.
88 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
from the farm to the factory during the past fifty years, until
today only about forty per cent of the butter entering into the
markets is made on the farm. In 1909, for instance, 24,570,-
976 pounds of butter were reported as made in factories in
Illinois, while only 10,534,606 were sold from the farms.
However, the total farm production was reported as 46,609,-
992 pounds, the amount not sold presumably being consumed
by the farmers' families. 27 Each of these items shows a steady
decrease, as the dairy industry has migrated to Wisconsin and
other states which now supply the wants of Illinois consumers
in ever larger measure.
The production of cheese, which had been steadily falling
during the previous period, showed a remarkable growth
amounting to almost fifty per cent in the second half of the
nineties. This was due to the production of filled cheese, but
the boom in this industry was short lived. The cheese indus-
try fell off to about one-third of its previous amount, owing to r f
the coincidence of two destructive factors. One of these was
the introduction of separators on the farms, which deprived
the city factories of their needed supplies of skim milk; the
other was the passage of a law prohibiting the manufacture
of filled cheese. There was a slight recovery during the years
19051909, but after that the decline set in again. Since the
outbreak of the European war there has been a growth of
condensaries and cheese factories in the northern division, but
the experience of the past seems to indicate that cheese produc-
tion is a passing industry unless some permanent changes take
place.
The production of cream, on the other hand, has shown a
steady and, in the last few years, a very marked growth. This
has accompanied, as it has doubtless been caused by, an increase
in the price of cream. The industry has always been most
important in the northern division, though of recent years the
southern division has begun to encroach upon it. The develop-
27 Thirteenth Census of the United States, 5:489-491. The consumption by
the average farmer's family is considerably larger than that of the average urban
family.
PRODUCTS OF THE FARM 89
ment of the cream industry in Effingham and Carroll counties
and its decline in Kane county are the most important recent
movements. For the state as a whole the amount of cream
sold from the farms has increased from 1,056,825 gallons in
1895 to 3,098,994 in 1917. Most of this is sold to cream-
eries, butter factories, ice cream and similar establishments.
The fourth group of domestic animals enumerated above
consists of fowls. Taken as a group these showed a marked
decline between 1890 and 1900, but since the latter date have
increased again though not to the earlier figure. In spite of
these fluctuations Illinois has maintained her position as second
state in the union in the number of fowls. Chickens made up
ninety per cent of all in 1890 and over ninety-seven per cent in
1910, as the other kinds of fowls are decreasing very rapidly.
There were only one-fifth as many turkeys in the state in 1910
as there had been in 1890, and about one-third as many ducks
and geese. So far as the Illinois farmer is a poultry raiser
he exemplifies here again his tendency to concentrate upon one
staple. The industry was spread very evenly over the whole
state, with the central division slightly in the lead.
In this brief survey of the development of agriculture in
Illinois only the half has been said. Some problems have been
barely touched upon and others necessarily omitted. But
enough has been written to show that there has been steady
progress. It is, however, equally clear that much remains to
be done if Illinois agriculture is to maintain its position and to
advance in the future. New adaptations and adjustments must
be made, problems of labor scarcity solved, better methods
of marketing and rural credit devised, and farm life be made
more attractive. To meet and solve these difficulties reliance
must be placed largely upon education. Much has already
been done in this direction. Science has been applied to agri-
cultural problems, experiments carried on in experiment sta-
tions, the results disseminated among the farmers by means of
bulletins, extension work, and conferences. Experts are being
placed in the counties as advisors to the farmers. The number
90 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of students in the state college of agriculture is steadily grow-
ing, and an increasing number of the graduates is going back
to the farms equipped with a knowledge of scientific agriculture.
Agricultural education is also being carried down into the
secondary schools, and several hundred high schools in the
state now give courses in this subject. To the boys and girls
thus trained the future of Illinois agriculture may safely be
entrusted.
V. MANUFACTURES
ILLINOIS was the third manufacturing state in the union in
1893. Only a few years before it had been counted as a
purely agricultural state and its citizens classed as farmers
rather than factory operatives ; in 1 893 it ranked with the oldest
manufacturing states in the country as a great industrial com-
monwealth, whose claim to economic preeminence rested not
merely upon its fertile soil but also upon the ability of its work-
ers to transform the resources of forest and field and mines into
articles of utility and enduring worth. This high rank in man-
ufactures was, however, ascribable in large measure to the
preeminence of the state as a producer of foodstuffs and to its
location in the corn belt, for three out of the first five manu-
facturing industries were closely linked with agriculture, and
in the not far remote past had been carried on upon the farm
rather than in factories.
The following list comprises all manufactures which pro-
duced in 1890 products valued at $5,000,000 or more, in the
order of their importance:
LEADING MANUFACTURES IN ILLINOIS, 1890
INDUSTRY Value of products
All industries $908,640,280
Slaughtering and meat packing, wholesale 200,414,531
Liquors, distilled 5 I >99<5737
Foundry and machine shop products 38,898,114
Flour and grist mill products 37.974.885
Iron and steel 37 1 73.4O5
Clothing, men's, factory product 33,626,441
Agricultural implements 24,609,660
Lumber, planing mill products, including sash, doors, and blinds. .. . 20,468,903
Carpentering ^ 20,392,422
Printing and publishing, newspapers and periodicals 17,348,845
Cars, steam railroad, not including operations of railroad companies 17,117,223
Masonry, brick and stone 15,792,212
All other industries (not listed) 15,428,884
Printing and publishing, book and job 14,555,068
Furniture, factory product 14,406,835
Liquors, malt 13,664,046
92 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
LEADING MANUFACTURES IN ILLINOIS, 1890 Continued
INDUSTRY Value of products
Clothing, men's custom work and repairing 13,556,581
Cars and general shop construction and repairs by steam railroad
companies 12,208,617
Slaughtering, wholesale, not including meat packing 11,876,851
Soap and candles 9>857,55O
Coffee and spice, roasting and grinding 9.367,983
Carriages and wagons, including custom work and repairing 9,041,725
Bread and other bakery products 8,832,725
Boots and shoes, factory product 8,756,824
Leather, tanned and curried 8,240,803
Cheese, butter, and condensed milk, factory product 8,004,991
Tobacco, cigars, and cigarettes 6,942,185
Tinsmithing, coppersmithing, and sheet-iron working 6,827,538
Plumbing and gas fittting 6,455,007
Clothing, women's factory product 6,422,43 1
Brick and tile 6,399,492
Painting and paper hanging 6,201,553
Iron work, architectural and ornamental 5,438,026
Gas, illuminating and heating 5,204,206
Lumber and other mill products from logs or bolts 5i9>94Q
The great preeminence of the slaughtering and meat pack-
ing industry is somewhat misleading, for its large total included
a disproportionate cost of materials, amounting in this case to
$170,000,000. If the order were based upon the net value,
after deducting the value of materials, which alone is properly
attributable to the process of manufacture, distilled liquors
would rank first with a net product of $48,000,000, while meat
packing would sink to second place with only $30,000,000 to
its credit. But the figure for distilled liquors is also somewhat
misleading, for in 1890 there was a federal excise tax of sev-
enty cents a gallon on distilled liquors, which was responsible
for fully two-thirds of the value here attributed to the process
of manufacture. Other leading industries would rank in the
following order, according to the criterion of value added by
manufacture : foundry and machine shop products, men's cloth-
ing, agricultural implements, printing and publishing news-
papers and periodicals, carpentering, book and job printing,
malt liquors, planed lumber, furniture, iron and steel, railroad
cars. This list brings clearly to the front the " pure " manu-
factures which depend for their value upon the processes which
transform the crude raw material into finished goods, in most
cases ready for the ultimate consumer. Upon the develop-
MANUFACTURES 93
ment of these factory industries alone Illinois could safely rely
for her high rank as a manufacturing state.
During the next decade from 1890 to 1900, there was a
rapid expansion of manufactures in spite of the long period
of depression within the decade. The years 18971900 were
years marked by a particularly rapid development. The popu-
lation increased during this decade twenty-six per cent, but the
number of manufacturing establishments almost doubled and
the number of wage earners engaged in manufactures, the value
of the products, and other significant items indicating industrial
expansion all showed a growth much more rapid than that of
the population. 1 On the whole the changes seemed to point to
a general growth of small and moderate sized establishments
and to their dissemination throughout the state.
The next decade from 1900 to 1910, revealed no slacken-
ing in the manufacturing development thus begun. The per-
centage of increase of practically all items given by the census
in connection with manufactures was greater than in the pre-
vious decade. There was one significant exception the num-
ber of establishments showed a much smaller growth. This
fact, coupled with the great expansion in other respects, indi-
cates what is undoubtedly the case, that there was less of a
tendency during this period to build new plants than to
strengthen and enlarge the existing ones. The tendency
toward large scale production was already manifesting itself
vigorously.
During the five years from 1910 to 1914, when the last
census investigation of manufactures was made, there was a
falling off in about two-thirds of the items. 2 The total number
of establishments remained almost stationary, while the per-
sons engaged in manufactures increased only ten per cent. Al-
though the latter year was in some respects a rather abnormal
year, the position which Illinois has attained as a manufactur-
ing state is best indicated by selecting this date for fuller
statement.
1 See appendix, p. 501.
2 Census of Manufactures: Illinois, 1914.
94 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
In 1914 Illinois was more of an industrial than an agricul-
tural or a mining state. In this year the value added to its
products by manufacturing was $907,139,412, while the value
of its agricultural products in 1910 was $586,517,053, and
of its mineral products $76,658,974. Illinois ranked third
among the 49 states and territories as a manufacturing state.
It also ranked third as regards population, with 5,986,781
persons, of whom 617,927 or 10.4 per cent were engaged in
manufactures. 3 Almost two-thirds of the population lived
under urban or semiurban conditions, as 61.7 per cent of all
lived in incorporated places having twenty-five hundred inhabi-
tants or over. Illinois was well supplied with agricultural raw
materials, with coal for power, and with a large labor force.
The state was also provided with excellent transportation facil-
ities: in 1914, there were 152 railroad companies having lines
within the state, and nearly every county was traversed by one
or more railroads, many of them trunk lines running into Chi-
cago or St. Louis. There were approximately 12,000 miles of
main track of steam railroads in the state, besides over 1,500
miles of electric railroads. 4 In addition to these ample railway
facilities, the state has the advantages of cheap water transpor-
tation afforded by the Mississippi and its navigable tributaries,
and by the Great Lakes. Access is thus afforded to an un-
rivaled market, consisting of a prosperous and well-to-do agri-
cultural population, with a high standard of living and a will-
ingness to spend.
The great progress made in manufactures cannot be shown
better than by listing the leading manufacturing industries. In
1914 there were 124 such industries in the state, each of which
reported products to the value of $1,000,000 or over. The
aggregate value of all manufactures reached the enormous
total of $2,247,322,819 or almost two and one-half times as
much as the products of twenty-five years before. It will be
impossible to enumerate all these but the list of those only
8 Estimates of Population of the United States, 15.
4 Report on Statistics of Railways in the United States, 1914; Report of the
Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1913.
MANUFACTURES
95
which produce over $20,000,000 worth a year is an impressive
one and shows the leading lines of manufactures in the state.
LEADING MANUFACTURES IN ILLINOIS, 1914 5
INDUSTRY
Number
of estab-
lishments
Average
number of
wage
earners
Value of
products
Value added
by
manufacture
All industries
18 388
j.
Slaughtering and meat packing.
Foundry and machine-shop prod-
98
1. 771
31,627
489,230,324
77.215,741
Printing and publishing
2 722
12 878
80,722,363
Clothing, men's, including shirts.
Agricultural implements
604
11
35,"9
112,033,427
89,144,448
79,5558i2
47,833,982
Iron and steel, steel works and
rolling mills
2C
Cars, steam-railroaded, not in-
cluding operations of railroad
2*
18 ooo
(\t it e 678
25,57,57
m 886 STI
7
gee
CT eo6 022
Flour mill and grist mill prod-
406
2. 708
4.Q 4.Q3.224.
42,909,014
Electrical machinery, apparatus,
142
l6.4.8t
AC 667 d.c6
*%(. -)99 ?n?
Bread and other bakery products
Lumber and timber products...
Cars and general shop construc-
tion and repairs by steam-rail-
road companies
2,278
618
94
10,404
14,870
28,682
45,250,060
42,064,008
AI AQ6 HO
21,611,189
17,939,874
Liquors malt
89
e.740
jQ.Ase.QQC,
Furniture and refrigerators
283
11.766
12 OOQ C.67
Gas, illuminating and heating. .
Tobacco manufactures
75
1,622
3,890
7. 6??
28,170,560
26 O36.72Q
20,135,071
ic 082 887
Iron and steel, blast furnaces. . .
Copper, tin, and sheet-iron prod-
5
508
1,450
7,44 c
25,861,528
24.8 I ^.^So
4,067,381
TO QQO <^6
Paints and varnishes
72
2,1 IO
2d.d.88.'140
Confectionery
147
C,,OOQ
22.I48.C. e ,Q
TO OJ.7 Q26
Coffee and spice, roasting and
14
I.IO*
22.O44..S88
A QCO OO8
Butter, cheese, and condensed
milk
267
I,7ec
2I.7Q2.22O
5 ,cc6.<88
27
2 i T 11
21,420,035
6.167,142
Clothing women's
241
8. ill
2O.75O. ?<O
or ^i.74
5 Census of Manufactures: Illinois, 1914, p. 4.
96 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
If this list is compared with that for 1890 several changes
may be noted. In the first place there has been a great in-
crease in the value of the product of the leading industries:
whereas in 1890 there were only 34 industries which turned
out $5,000,000 or over, in 1914 there were 53 such industries.
Part of this increase in value must, however, be credited to the
general rise in prices during this period.
In the second place there has been a shift in the order of
importance. Slaughtering and meat packing still retains its
primacy, but foundry and machine shop products have moved
up from third to second place, while distilled liquors, which
was previously second, has now sunk to eighth place. Printing
and publishing has moved up from tenth to third, and men's
clothing from sixth to fourth place. Agricultural implements
stands in fifth place instead of eighth, while iron and steel has
sunk to sixth place ; flour mill and gristmill products fall from
fourth to ninth position. In general there is observable a ten-
dency for the industries which are most typical of the factory
system to forge to the front at the expense of those whose
value depends largely upon the cost of materials incorporated
in them.
This is very clearly shown by comparing the rank of indus-
tries when based on the value added by manufacture with their
rank in the fourth column of the table, which is determined by
the gross value of products. According to their rank as pure
manufactures, based on the net value of the products, the order
of the first ten industries would be as follows : foundry and ma-
chine shop products, printing and publishing, slaughtering and
meat packing, men's clothing, distilled liquors, agricultural im-
plements, malt liquors, electrical machinery, iron and steel, and
cars and general shop construction. In those industries in
which the manufacturing processes are comparatively simple
or are carried on largely by the aid of machinery, the value
added by manufacture is of course small, and these industries
consequently do not rank so high when judged by this criterion.
6 Seeabovep. 91-92.
MANUFACTURES 97
This is especially noticeable in such industries as the flour mills
and gristmills, blast furnaces, roasting and grinding of coffee
and spice, and the butter, cheese, and condensed milk indus-
tries. In all these the value of materials figures largely in the
value of the finished product.
It is noteworthy that in four of the manufacturing indus-
tries enumerated above Illinois holds first rank among all the
states. Slaughtering and meat packing is not merely the lead-
ing industry in Illinois, but this state holds the undisputed
primacy as compared with others and produces almost one-
third of the national output. The other industries in which
this state holds first rank are agricultural implements with
over one-third of the nation's total, distilled liquors with about
one-quarter, and railroad cars. Second place is held in print-
ing and publishing. It is clear that the growth of manufactures
in Illinois rests upon a substantial foundation of natural re-
sources and favorable location which offer a guarantee for
their permanence and further growth.
So rapid has been the industrial development, however, and
so difficult have been some of the problems of adjustment that
certain evils have inevitably developed, especially in the city of
Chicago. Problems of housing, and congestion outside the fac-
tories, problems of hours and pay, of safeguarding health,
life, and limb within the factory, of workmen's compensation,
of organization of labor, of sweat shops and child labor
these and many others have pressed for solution and have been
met with varying degrees of success. The dominant note of
Illinois manufactures in the past has been a vigorous, at times
almost a ruthless, purpose to succeed. While this spirit has
brought Illinois to the forefront as an industrial commonwealth
it has sometimes been at a great cost when measured not merely
in materials or money, but rather in human suffering. With
the achievement of assured success, however, there is evidenced
in recent years a more humanitarian note, which has responded
to an awakened social consciousness and is doing much to rem-
edy existing abuses.
98 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Among the problems for which thus far no satisfactory
solution has been found is that of unemployment, and of irregu-
lar and seasonal employment. This seems bound up in the
nature of certain industries and is due to variations in demand,
seasonal changes, and similar factors. But there is un-
doubtedly a certain amount of avoidable instability in the labor
market, which might be overcome by a better organization of
industry. Taking all the manufactures of the state together
in 1914, the maximum number of employees in any month dur-
ing the year was 521,752, the minimum 483,275, or a differ-
ence of more than 38,000 persons. Thus it is seen that in Illi-
nois, as in other industrial communities, the phenomenon of
unemployment, one of the evils growing out of the modern in-
dustrial system, has made its appearance.
The general tendency toward large scale production and
the concentration of industries in large establishments is also
exemplified in Illinois. Before combination or concentration
of industry could be carried very far several conditions favor-
able to its growth had to be met. Among these were the stan-
dardization of machinery and methods, the creation of ade-
quate accounting systems, the development of the corporate
form of organization, the organization of stock and produce
exchanges, the perfecting of the telegraph, telephone, and type-
writer, and, most important of all, the building and organiza-
tion of railroads. It will later be pointed out how well
supplied Illinois was with adequate rail and water transporta-
tion facilities. 7 With their growth, and that of improvements
in means of communication, there has gone on a steady widen-
ing of the market and consequently an expansion of the busi-
ness unit.
There has also been a steady growth in corporate owner-
ship and in the corporate form of organization of manufactur-
ing enterprises. In 1873 there were only 1,090 corporations
of all kinds in Illinois, of which 578 were located in Cook
county; only four counties in the state had as many as 25 corpo-
7 See chapters vi and vii.
MANUFACTURES 99
rations. By 1914, out of the 18,388 manufacturing establish-
ments listed by the census which includes only those under
the factory system 5,993 or 32.6 per cent were under cor-
porate ownership, while 16.8 per cent were firms, and 50.6 per
cent were carried on by individuals.
The connection between the corporate form of organiza-
tion and large scale production is indicated by the fact that
while only 32.6 per cent of the manufacturing establishments
were corporations, they employed 86.2 per cent of all the wage
earners and turned out 90 per cent of all the products. The
growth of corporations and of concentration in production
have gone on hand in hand. The industries with the largest
percentage of establishments under corporate form of owner-
ship in Illinois in 1914 were agricultural implements, automo-
biles, foundry and machine shop products, furniture and refrig-
erators, paint and varnish, and slaughtering and meat packing. 8
The extent to which large scale production dominates man-
ufactures in Illinois is shown by the fact that while there were
in 1914 only 336 establishments out of 18,388 in the state
which produced $1,000,000 or over in value of product, yet
these few establishments, constituting less than two per cent of
all, employed over two-fifths of all the wage earners (43.9
per cent) and turned out three-fifths of all the products (59.7
per cent). This tendency to concentrate in fewer establish-
ments, but of larger size, has been in evidence since the eighties,
but has been greatly accelerated during the last two decades.
It is most marked in the case of agricultural implements, auto-
mobiles, the tanning, currying, and finishing of leather, the
paint and varnish industry, and slaughtering and meat pack-
ing. In every one of these industries over half of the establish-
ments reported products valued at over $100,000 each.
A better index of concentration in large scale establish-
ments even than the output is the number of employees. If
this test be applied it is discovered that in 1914 there were
forty-six establishments in the state which employed over 1,000
8 See appendix, p. 502.
ioo THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
wage earners each. There were nine slaughtering and meat
packing plants; six steam railroad repair shops; five steel
works and rolling mills; four car manufacturing concerns; four
factories for men's clothing; three agricultural implement fac-
tories; two clock and watch factories; two electrical machinery
establishments; one boot and shoe factory; one furniture and
refrigerator factory; one gas plant; one gas and electric fixture
establishment; one piano and organ factory; one printing and
publishing house; besides two not specified. The importance
of these forty-six plants is seen from the fact that they em-
ployed 115,247 persons, or 22.7 per cent of all the wage
earners engaged in manufactures in the state.
The causes which have brought about this concentration of
manufactures into large and even larger establishments have
been the existence of certain advantages which large scale
production possesses. The operation of a business on a large
scale permits the use of expensive and complicated machinery,
its constant employment, the minute division of labor and con-
sequent specialization of each, worker, the employment of more
skilled management and superintendence, the utilization of by-
products, the economical purchase of the raw materials, and
the advantageous marketing of the finished product. Under
modern methods of machine production a well-equipped fac-
tory requires a large investment in expensive machinery and
plant, and in these industries the size of the most efficient busi-
ness unit is necessarily large.
One of the most striking economies in large scale produc-
tion is the utilization of by-products which in small establish-
ments are wasted. This has been carried farthest in the
slaughtering and meat packing industry, but it is also practiced
extensively in the iron and steel, woodworking, paper, leather,
distilling, and other industries.
It must not, however, be imagined that all industry is car-
ried on upon such a large scale. There are still many small
establishments scattered throughout the state. For instance,
2,613 establishments reported no wage earners in 1914, the
MANUFACTURES 101
proprietor himself performing all the labor. This was particu-
larly marked in the bakery, printing and publishing, and tobacco
industries. In addition to these there were 9,039 establish-
ments with from one to five persons employed, the same three
industries again predominating. Somewhat over one-third
(33-5 P er cent) of all the manufacturing establishments in the
state reported products for the year of less than $5,000, and
another third (32.1 per cent) produced between $5,000 and
$20,000 a year.
The industries reporting the smallest output per estab-
lishment were the manufacture of leather goods, printing and
publishing, the manufacture of patent medicines, the manufac-
ture of copper, tin, and sheet-iron products, and the manufac-
ture of carriages and wagons. In each of these industries more
than seventy per cent of the establishments reported products
valued at less than $20,000 for the year 1914. The small con-
cerns are to be found principally in the southern part of the
state but may also be met with in the central and northern divi-
sions. There is consequently no reason to assume that indi-
vidual initiative is in danger of being crushed by big business
in Illinois or that there is no scope for the enterprise and
energy of the man with small capital. Indeed many of the in-
dustries for which the state is today famous have had just such
humble beginnings.
Paralleling the tendency to concentrate manufacturing
processes in large establishments, there is also observable in
Illinois a tendency for manufacturing establishments to localize
in particular districts. While sometimes the choice of a loca-
tion seems to be fortuitous, it will usually be found to have been
determined by economic forces. That place which can offer
the greatest advantages nearness to materials and markets,
adequate transportation facilities, an abundant labor supply,
and other factors is the one where the new establishments
will be located. Moreover since most of these conditions are
most satisfactorily met in the cities, it is in these places that
manufactures have developed most rapidly.
102 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
In Illinois the city of Chicago is the unrivaled center of
industry by right of every economic advantage. Not only is
Chicago the most important manufacturing city in Illinois, but
it ranks second only to New York City among the cities of the
United States. Its manufactures were valued at $1,483,498,-
416 in 1914, or two-thirds of those for the whole state. In-
deed there were only four states outside of Illinois whose total
product exceeded that of this city, namely New York, Pennsyl-
vania, Massachusetts, and Ohio. The list of industries to
whose presence Chicago owes its industrial preeminence is prac-
tically identical with that for the state at large, already given.
Altogether the census lists 274 separate industries for this city. 9
Peoria holds second place in the state in the value of manu-
factures, reporting products valued at $64,689,045 in 1914.
The leading industry in the city is distilled liquors, the four
distilleries situated there turning out about one-fifth of the total
product of the country; others of importance are slaughtering
and meat packing, printing and publishing, the manufacture of
agricultural implements, paper and wood pulp, malt liquors,
cooperage, cordage and twine, food preparations and bakery
products.
Joliet holds third place among the manufacturing cities of
Illinois, with an output of $30,091,415, a considerable de-
crease from that of five years earlier. The operations of steel
works and rolling mills and of blast furnaces, and the manu-
facture of coke and wire, were the chief industries.
East St. Louis showed the greatest growth of any city in
the state in the output of manufactures during the past decade.
In 1914 these amounted to $26,904,565. The principal indus-
tries were flour mills and gristmills, chemicals, slaughtering
and meat packing, rolling mills, foundries and machine shops,
paints, and steam railroad repair shops.
Rockford ranked fifth in value of manufactures, with $26,-
371,219, but second in the number of employees. This city
has a great diversity of manufactures, but the furniture factor-
9 See appendix, p. 502.
MANUFACTURES 103
ies, knitting mills, and foundries and machine shops furnished
employment to more than one-half of the wage earners. .
Moline is well known on account of the large number of
plows manufactured there. Four establishments manufactur-
ing agricultural implements overshadowed everything else, pro-
ducing almost half of the manufacturing output for the city,
which totaled $19,925,106. The manufacture of automobiles
and carriages and wagons are also among the leading
industries.
There were eight other cities in the state in 1914 which
reported manufactures in excess of $10,000,000. These were
as follows in the order of their importance, together with their
leading manufactures :
Granite City rolling mill products, glucose, Babbitt metal
and solder, stamped and enameled ware, and tinware.
Chicago Heights rolling mill products, foundry and ma-
chine shop products, railroad cars, and chemicals.
Alton flour, glass, and slaughtering and meat packing.
Waukegan rolling mill products, food products, gas,
leather.
Decatur railroad car repairing, plumbers' supplies, and
starch.
Springfield flour, boots and shoes, watches, zinc, agri-
cultural implements, zinc smelting and refining, printing and
publishing, electrical machinery, and malt liquors.
Aurora railroad car repairing, foundry and machine
shop products, corsets, and builders' hardware.
Elgin watches, printing and publishing, condensed milk,
and watch cases.
There are four or five manufacturing industries in which
Illinois holds such preeminent rank that a somewhat fuller
treatment is demanded for them. These are slaughtering and
meat packing, iron and steel, car building, agricultural imple-
ments, and printing and publishing.
Slaughtering and meat packing is not only the most impor-
tant manufacturing industry in Illinois, but this state leads all
io 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
others in the magnitude of its operations in this line. Under
this head are included only establishments engaged in slaugh-
tering cattle for the wholesale trade and in curing or packing
meat for the wholesale market. 10 In Illinois, where most of the
product is destined for a distant market or for export, the pack-
ing industry is more important than the slaughtering industry
alone, but both are usually conducted by the same establish-
ments.
The most striking features in this industry are its concen-
tration in large establishments and the utilization of the by-
products. The tendency toward large scale production has
been marked from the beginning and has apparently not yet
come to an end. The number of establishments in the state
actually declined between 1889 and 1914 from 81 to 70, al-
though the value of the products grew for the same years from
$212,000,000 to $485,000,000 and the number of wage earn-
ers from 17,932 to 3 1,3 1 5. li The average establishment was
of course much larger at the end of this period than at the be-
ginning. In 1914 almost 84 per cent of the wage earners in
this industry were at work in establishments employing over
1,000 wage earners each.
This concentration of the industry in a few hands has been
greatly stimulated by the utilization of more and more of the
by-products. Until comparatively late years little attempt was
made to utilize the waste products of the abattoir. In fact the
disposal of the waste material was a source of expense; but
10 The livestock trade is described in chapter IV.
11 The following table shows these facts for each census period from 1889
to 1914.
SLAUGHTERING AND MEAT PACKING IN ILLINOIS, 1889-1914
YEAR
Number of
establishments
Number of
wage earners
Value of
products
1889
la
17, 04,2
$212,291,382
1800
64.
27,861
288.671.770
IQO4.
68
26. QS1
7l8, 2OI.2C3
"7C
26,^.14
389,594,906
I Old.
7O
4 1. i e
4.8^.362.180
MANUFACTURES 105
gradually industries grew up, producing glue, tallow, soap, and
fertilizer from the waste products of the slaughter houses.
With increasing competition the packing houses gradually ab-
sorbed these industries and developed new ones, until today
the utilization of what was formerly waste affords a substan-
tial profit. The aim is that nothing shall be wasted, and this
laudable ambition seems pretty fully realized.
In 1903 the inevitable tendency toward combination as-
serted itself, and the leading packing houses of Armour, Swift,
and Morris organized the National Packing Company. The
method of combination was first by purchase of some seven
smaller concerns by the three firms just named, and then the
organization of a holding company. 12 Voluntary dissolution
of this company was affected in 1912 by the distribution of its
property and assets on the basis of stock holdings, in accord-
ance with which Swift and Company took over about 46 per
cent, Armour and Company about 40 per cent, and Morris and
Company the remaining 14 per cent.
There are relatively few industries with capitals reaching
into the millions, in which, as in the case of the leading pack-
ing houses, the founders and their heirs have remained active
heads of the business for so long a time. For half a century
the names of Armour, Swift, Morris, Cudahy, and others
have been synonymous with this industry in Illinois; and to
their energy and ability the truly marvellous success of their
concerns is largely due.
More than in most industries there has been a great con-
centration of the slaughtering and packing business in a few
large centers. In Illinois Chicago has outdistanced all com-
petitors until today it turns out three-quarters of all the pack-
ing products in the state and about one-quarter of all in the
entire United States. There has been a steady pressure to
transfer the business to Chicago and one after another of the
smaller towns have had to give up the industry. They are un-
12 For the steps in this consolidation see The Economist, June 28, July 19,
August 1 6, 1902.
io6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
able to compete with the large scale production of the big
plants with their resulting economies, and convenience of trans-
portation and other facilities both for sellers and buyers.
These immense packing plants in Chicago have created what is
known as " Packingtown." This industry, with the allied busi-
nesses which have grown up around it, and those which purvey
to the workers, constitute together a town probably larger than
any in the state exclusive of Chicago itself.
The most striking features in the development of the iron
and steel industry in the last twenty-five years have been, first,
the changes in methods of production, and second, the move-
ment toward consolidation and combination. The iron and
steel industry falls into two general divisions, one comprising
the production of pig iron, and the other the conversion of pig
iron into various iron and steel products. Illinois, which is far
removed from the deposits of anthracite, has had to depend
upon bituminous coal, which is almost exclusively used in the
form of coke in the blast furnaces of this state. In the pro-
duction of steel there has been a striking decline in the output
of Bessemer in favor of open-hearth steel, the proportion
which the former makes up of the whole having fallen steadily
from 85 per cent in 1890 to 49 per cent in 1914.
Even more notable has been the movement toward con-
solidation and combination. The size of the individual estab-
lishment has shown a growth which is noteworthy even in a
period of large scale production. The number of blast fur-
naces was the same, namely five, in 1914 as it had been in
i89O, 13 but the output quadrupled, indicating that each estab-
lishment was much larger. The Illinois furnaces, which are of
modern construction and equipped with improved blowing ma-
chinery and moreover use the rich iron ores of the Lake Super-
ior region, report the largest daily capacities of any state.
A similar movement has taken place in the steel rolling mills:
although there was a slight increase from 19 to 25 establish-
ments, the value of the products trebled between 1890 and
13 Census of Manufactures: Iron and Steel, 1914, p. 72.
MANUFACTURES 107
1914. In the latter year there were five mills with over 1,000
employees and three others with between 500 and i,ooo. 14
As the census of 1914 was taken in a year of extreme depres-
sion, the figures for this year show a development less than
might have been expected.
Even more impressive than the growth in size of single
establishments has been the tendency toward the combination
of hitherto competing companies into one vast concern. While
this has been a general phenomenon it has nowhere been more
strikingly exemplified than in the iron and steel industry. The
causes which have led to combination were many. The enor-
mous investment of capital kept the number of competitors
small and to that extent made the movement more feasible.
It has been estimated that it requires between $20,000,000 and
$30,000,000 to build and equip a modern plant for the manu-
facture of iron and steel. And to this must be added further
sums to control the iron mines and transportation facilities.
But the most effective cause was the excessive fluctuations in
the price of the products. No industry is more influenced by
changes in the general industrial situation, by political issues,
labor disturbances, conditions of the crops, currency, foreign
relations, and similar factors. Production was essentially un-
regulated, as in every industry with a large fixed capital, and
tended to overproduction.
Combination was therefore resorted to primarily in order
to control prices. At first, this took the form of pooling. The
National Steel Association, the Western Nail Manufacturers'
Association, and the Stove Manufacturers' Association sought
ineffectually to control the output and price cutting. 15 As
something more binding than a pooling arrangement was seen
to be necessary, consolidation by merger and stock ownership
was next developed, especially after 1900. Various Illinois
concerns were drawn into the Allis-Chalmers Company, the
American Can Company, and the Republic Iron and Steel
14 Ibid., 30.
15 Western Manufacturer, 6:127; 9:188; 11:255, 465; 14:86, 156.
io8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Company. Of larger proportions were the organization of
the Federal Steel Company and the American Steel and Wire
Company of Illinois. The former was a holding company
combining the Illinois Steel Company with some other con-
cerns and brought together the South Chicago, the North Chi-
cago, the Union, and the Joliet rolling mills, together with
four or five short railroads in the vicinity of Chicago. The
American Steel and Wire Company, formed in 1899, was the
largest Illinois corporation yet organized in this line and con-
solidated the Ellwood Manufacturing Company and the Ell-
wood Wire and Nail Company of De Kalb; the Washburn and
Moen Manufacturing Company of Waukegan; the Consoli-
dated Barb Wire Company and the Laidlaw Bale Tie Com-
pany of Joliet; the Garden City Wire and Spring Company of
Chicago. 16
By the formation of the United Steel Corporation in 1901
these two combinations were themselves swept into the larger
combination, together with the American Bridge Company in
which were the Lassig Bridge and Iron Works and the Amer-
ican Bridge Works at Chicago, and the American Tin Plate
Company which owned the four mills of the Great Western
Tin Plate Works at Joliet. Since that time there has been
little change in the situation in the iron and steel industry.
Closely allied with the iron and steel industry is the car
building industry, in which Illinois holds first rank in the
United States. This is due chiefly to the great extension of
railway facilities in this and neighboring states and to the con-
venient location of Chicago and other Illinois cities as centers
of the industry. Aside from 73 establishments maintained by
the railroads themselves for construction and repair of cars,
there were 28 car building establishments in the state in I9io. 17
Of these the most important is the Pullman Company. The
organization of the Pullman Palace Car Company dates back
to 1867, when George M. Pullman, the inventor of the palace
16 Report of the Commissioner of Corporations on the Steel Industry, July i,
1911, table 3, p. 107.
17 Thirteenth Census of the United States, supplement for Illinois, 702.
MANUFACTURES 109
car, established the industry. In 1880 he founded the town
of Pullman in Illinois. In 1899 control of the Wagner Palace
Car Company of Buffalo was acquired and the name was
changed to the Pullman Company. It manufactures and oper-
ates drawing-room, sleeping and dining cars,- and owns and
operates extensive plants in five other cities outside of Chi-
cago, although the principal part of the business is carried on
there.
Since 1890 Illinois has held first rank in the United States
as a producer of agricultural implements. Its central location
and proximity to the rich prairie farms of the central west is
the primary cause of its preeminence. New centers of manu-
facture have appeared within the past decade in states farther
west, but nothing has occurred as yet to shake Illinois' leader-
ship. Within the state Chicago ranks first as the seat of this
manufacture. This high rank is due chiefly to the extensive
manufacture of harvesting machines, in which it leads all cities
and indeed all states in the world. It also produces over half
of all the grain harvesters, headers and binders, mowers, and
reapers manufactured in the United States.
Moline ranks as the second city in Illinois in the value of
its manufactures of agricultural implements, but it confines
itself chiefly to implements of cultivation. Here are located
the Moline Plow Works and the factories of Deere and Com-
pany, famed especially for their plows and cultivators. Peoria
is the only other city which contributes notably to this industry
in the value of product, though numerous other cities and
towns are distinguished for the excellence of particular im-
plements.
Illinois leads in the production of most of the principal
agricultural implements, as cultivators, harrows, plows, plant-
ers and drills, harvesters, headers and binders, horse hay-
rakes, and mowers. But it is from harvesting implements that
it derives its supremacy. The same tendency which has con-
centrated the industry in Illinois has also led to the specializa-
tion and consolidation of individual plants. There has been an
no THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
actual decrease in the number of establishments manufactur-
ing certain lines.
The greatest consolidation of establishments manufactur-
ing agricultural implements took place in 1902 with the incor-
poration of the* International Harvester Company. This new
organization acquired all but four of the largest harvester
companies in the country. Besides some subsidiary plants
like the Chicago Malleable Castings Company, the following
harvester manufacturing concerns were consolidated: the Mc-
Cormick Harvesting Machine Company, the Deering Har-
vester Company, the Piano Manufacturing Company, the
Warder, Bushwell and Glessner Company, and the Milwaukee
Harvester Company. The capital stock of the new corpora-
tion was $120,000,000, and the annual output of the five
plants after consolidation about 8,700,000 machines. 18 The
parent plant and the largest of all, the McCormick Company,
is located at Chicago.
Printing and publishing ranked third among the manufac-
turing industries of Illinois in 1914, and in this field Illinois
was surpassed only by New York. It had ranked tenth among
the industries of the state in 1890, but has steadily grown in
extent and importance. The explanation of this growth is
not to be found in the decline of illiteracy or the development
of culture and education among the people, although they
played an important role, but rather in the economic changes. 19
Before printing and publishing could be highly developed
certain industrial and mechanical improvements were neces-
sary. The improvement of the means of transportation
roads, steam railroads, and electric railways and of com-
munication the post office, telegraph, telephone, and even
the typewriter was necessary before the modern daily news-
paper and magazines could be produced. Cheap paper was
another necessary condition, which was solved by the use of
wood pulp for paper-making. By 1890 most of these im-
18 The Economist, February 15, March 8, 1902.
19 See chapter n.
MANUFACTURES in
provements had been invented and the rest followed before the
end of the century, so that the foundations were laid for a
rapid development.
But other changes, equally significant, were taking place
within the industry. Technical changes and new inventions
were revolutionizing the printing business. Of these the most
important was the invention of a typesetting machine, which
was finally perfected about i885. 20 The average speed of
composition has been increased from about 1,000 ems an
hour by hand to about 4,000 ems by machine. Although the
typesetting machines were invented in New York, it was not
long before they were introduced in Illinois; and in 1888 the
first linotype machine in this state was installed by the Chicago
Daily News. By 1895 most of the large papers in the state
were using them. Improvements in photo-engraving, which
dates as a modern process from about 1890, revolutionized
the periodical press, created a new department in the large
newspaper offices, and gave rise to a new independent industry.
The invention in 1914 of the process of" roto-gravure " marks
a further advance in the work of illustration. Electrotyping
and stereotyping were both greatly improved by mechanical
changes in the nineties. The foundation stone of the whole
industry the printing press had been brought to a high
degree of perfection before this period, but numerous improve-
ments and inventions have increased its efficiency, so that the
press of today is very different from that of even twenty-five
years ago.
Given these mechanical improvements in the industry, the
printing and publishing business, which was in the hands of
alert and capable men, was bound to show a marvelous ad-
vance. The value of the output increased from $17,348,845
in 1890 to $112,833,427 in 1914, and the number of daily
newspapers in the state grew less rapidly from 121 to 184.
But the aggregate circulation of the daily newspapers expanded
20 Thompson, History of Composing Machines, i. There are now three gen-
eral types of machines: the linotype, the monotype, and the simplex.
ii2 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
from 774,486 per issue at the former date to 2,620,661 at the
latter. In addition to the daily newspapers there were pub-
lished in the state in 1914 nearly 1,500 semiweekly and tri-
weekly, weekly, monthly, and quarterly periodicals.
Illinois ranks second among the states in the union in num-
ber and circulation of all classes of publications combined;
third in number and circulation of dailies; second in number
and circulation of weeklies; and second in number and in circu-
lation of monthly publications. 21 In addition to these periodi-
cals there is a vast amount of book and job printing carried
on in the printing establishments of every county in the state,
which swells the total to the figures already given. 22
21 Census of Manufactures: Illinois, 1914, p. 31.
22 For the information concerning the printing and publishing industry the
writer wishes to acknowledge his indebtedness to a thorough study of the subject
made by Dr. Frederic A. Russell and presented by him as a doctor's thesis
to the University of Illinois under the title Newspaper and Periodical Publish-
ing Industry in Illinois from 1880 to 1915.
VI. TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION
IF THE commercial development of a region depends upon
the combination of resources and location, then Illinois is
doubly favored, for its preeminence as an agricultural, mining,
and manufacturing state provides the materials for an extensive
commerce, while its commanding location gives it every advan-
tage of water and rail communication. Consequently the trade
and commerce of the state rival the other branches of economic
activity in importance and extent. In spite of their magnitude,
however, the movements of commerce have never been sub-
jected to statistical measurement in the United States, and
it is therefore impossible to trace them with any degree of
accuracy. It is necessary to fall back upon the data gathered
in the more important cities of the state and infer from these
the movements which have been taking place generally.
The high degree of specialization which has attended agri-
culture and the mining and manufacturing industries of the
state has meant that no group of workers has been able to
supply all its own wants. The distribution of products from
producers to distant markets and of other commodities to
the consumers has called into existence a great number of
merchants,, and wholesale, jobbing, and retail houses, whose
activities are essential to the welfare of the other interests and
whose business is enormous. Especially important is the grain
trade, which feeds many manufacturing establishments with
their raw materials and supplies the railways with the major
part of their traffic. Two of the twelve primary grain markets
in the country are situated within the state, of which Chicago
ranks first in the United States.
Chicago is by far the greatest commercial and distributing
center in Illinois; its commercial importance is due mainly to
"3
u 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
its geographical location and to the fact that it is the point
of convergence of the principal railroads of the western and
northwestern states and of the trunk lines which connect these
states with the principal cities of the Atlantic seaboard. But
the controlling factor in the commercial and industrial growth
of Chicago consists in the fact that this city is one of the
principal primary markets for the purchase and sale of the
agricultural products of this section of the country and for
the manufacture of certain of these products into the various
forms in which they appear in commerce.
The magnitude of the grain trade of Chicago may be best
indicated by giving a few figures. The total receipts of all
grain grew from 219,052,518 bushels in 1890 to 371,135,000
bushels in 1915, while the shipments increased from 204,674,-
918 to 299,090,000 bushels for the same years. Two things
may be noted even in these bare statistics. First, there has
been a very small growth in this trade, due to the shifting of
the center of production, the development of new markets,
and changes in the routes of transportation. In the second
place, the shipments are less than the receipts at each period,
but the difference has grown greater. This is caused by the
greater demands of the rapidly growing population of Chicago
for the incoming flour and grain for food, and also to its use
in local manufactories. The city consumption of all grain,
including flour, was estimated in 1890 to amount to 22,059,000
bushels; by 1915 this had increased to 119,394,000 bushels.
At the same time the manufacture of flour within the city grew
from 430,609 barrels in 1890 to 1,155,000 barrels in 1915. 1
Not only has the grain trade of Chicago failed to show
a growth corresponding with its industrial development, but
changes in the methods of handling the grain have lessened
the profits which have accrued to Chicago merchants in these
transactions. Before the development of cheap rail transpor-
tation to the east, the grain brought to Chicago after the close
1 Report of the Trade and Commerce of Chicago, 1915, p. 18. See tables in
appendix, p. 503. for the grain trade of Chicago.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 115
of lake transportation in the fall accumulated in elevators
where it was stored until the opening of navigation again in
the spring. With the advent of all-rail carriage of grain to
the Atlantic seaboard, which was not interrupted by seasonal
changes, the profits of the elevator business declined severely.
Although these establishments attempted to hold the business
which was slipping from their grasp, by reducing elevator
charges, the advantages of through shipments were so great
that it was impossible to prevent the change.
Owing to the gradual shifting of the slaughtering and meat
packing industry to points farther west, to Omaha and Kansas
City, the movements of livestock and dressed meats have
shown a still smaller rate of growth and in some respects
have even fallen off. But the total amount is still enormous.
Chicago is also an important market for lard, wool, and hides,
which may be designated as incidents of the packing industry.
Illinois cities and especially Chicago have always been
important distributive centers for agricultural products, but
the last twenty-five years have seen a great widening in the
range of commercial interests. 2 Today Chicago is the most
important inland city in distributive commerce in general.
While the amount of grain and provisions handled in this
city is a smaller proporton of the total products, the relative
loss in these lines has been more than compensated by the
innumerable variety of other commodities for which the city
has become the distributing center. The jobbing and whole-
sale business of Chicago in 1891 was estimated to have
amounted to $5i7,i66,ooo. 3 Her preeminence as a distrib-
uting center was attributed primarily to the cheap freight rates
both by rail and water which her merchants enjoyed. 4
It is not possible to measure the other branches of Chicago's
trade with any degree of exactness, as they have never been
subjected to statistical measurement, but there is no doubt that
they have shown a growth even greater than those which have
2 See table in appendix, p. 504.
3 Flinn, Chicago, 55.
4 Report of the Trade and Commerce of Chicago, 1890, p. 120.
n6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
been enumerated. In 1893 the trade of Chicago in farm
products, the products of local manufactories, and the whole-
sale trade, was estimated to amount to $1,434,700,000.
" Were the retail figures of the year and the extraordinary
work of hotels, railroads and other industries added," these
figures might be doubled. 5
The financial panic of 1893 and the long period of depres-
sion which followed it affected Chicago's trade adversely, but
it recovered quickly after 1896, and five years later the board
of trade was able to report optimistically as to the outlook.
"As an inevitable result of agricultural prosperity . .
Chicago's wholesale business in other lines, has been greatly
in excess of that of any previous year notably in clothing,
boots and shoes, furs, wooden and willow-ware, leather and
findings, hardware and cutlery, hats and caps ; in paper, books
and stationery, pig and manufactured iron, crockery and glass-
ware, wagons and carriages, stoves, furnaces, and wallpaper." 8
In 1904 the combined value of the wholesale trade and local
manufactures was $2,349,315,000; in 1910 they were $3,988.-
065,800; and by 1916 they had increased to $4,965,907,000.
Of this last sum, over half, or $2,854,298,000, represented
the wholesale trade alone. The most important branches of
the wholesale trade were the following: dry goods and carpets
($321,000,000), produce ($245,000,000), groceries ($181,-
000,000), lumber ($127,000,000), boots and shoes ($104,-
000,000), pig iron ($76,000,000), liquors and wines ($70,-
000,000), manufactured iron ($66,000,000), and tobacco
and cigars ( $60,000,000). 7
Although Chicago overshadows all other Illinois cities in
the wholesale and jobbing business, Peoria is of considerable
importance along this line. The reasons for Peoria's impor-
tance as a commercial center are, in large measure, her central
geographical location and her abundant facilities for trans-
B Industrial Chicago, 4: 279.
6 Report of the Trade and Commerce of Chicago, 1901, xiv.
7 Chicago Tribune, December 31, 1916. Each year an annual review of
trade is given for the year just ending.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 117
portation. The city is situated in the heart of a fertile agri-
cultural region and has a dozen railroads radiating from it
likes the spokes of a wheel from a hub. Few cities can equal
this transportation system, which brings into and distributes
from Peoria as a center the products of the soil, mine, and
forest, as well as merchandise, machinery, and all varieties
of manufactured products. The leading industry is distilled
liquors, and consequently the city is an important grain center
both for purposes of local 'manufacture and for distribution.
It is the second primary grain market in Illinois and the
eighth in the country, being surpassed in order of their rank
by Chicago, Minneapolis, Duluth, St. Louis, Milwaukee, Kan-
sas City, and Omaha. 8
Peoria is also a distributing center of packing house prod-
ucts, agricultural implements, and manufactured articles. It
was asserted by representatives of manufacturers of agricul-
tural implements in 1900 that it was then the most prominent
distributing point for these commodities not only in Illinois
but in the west generally. This was due to its central location
and its unusual facilities for distribution. Ten or twelve branch
houses, representing the most prominent implement manufac-
tories in the United States, were located there. In 1910 there
were reported to be large increases in the movement of spirits
and liquors, hay, agricultural implements, cooperage, lumber,
salt, oil, and miscellaneous freight. And in 1912 the tonnage
movement at Peoria was the largest on record up to that time. 9
East St. Louis ranks third among Illinois cities as a market
for grain and has a large number of elevators and warehouses.
It is not possible to give any statistics of this traffic, but it is
obvious that much of the grain credited to St. Louis by the
reports of the Merchants' Exchange of that city is really
handled in East St. Louis. Much of the grain from southern
and western Illinois is drawn to the St. Louis market.
Prior to 1910 the existing freight rates on grain from
8 See table in appendix, p. 504.
9 Report of the Trade and Commerce of Peoria, 1900, 1911, 1913.
n8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Illinois points to East St. Louis and to St. Louis worked a
hardship upon this market by inducing grain in territory which
was really tributary to these cities to go to other markets. But
after three years' negotiation with the Illinois railroads cen-
tering in East St. Louis and St. Louis, a very complete revision
of rates on grain was secured, removing the discrimination
against these cities. This revision affected a total of 898 sta-
tions in Illinois. The effect of this adjustment was demon-
strated by a steady growth and marked increase in shipments
of grain from Illinois points to East St. Louis and St. Louis. 10
Aside from this there is and always has been a very large trade
between St. Louis and that part of Illinois which is tributary
to it. A large percentage of the supplies of groceries, dry
goods, boots and shoes, clothing, hardware, and similar com-
modities for a large part of southern and western Illinois is
derived from St. Louis as the logical center for such traffic.
A movement which gained considerable ground after 1900
was the establishment in the centrally located cities of Illinois
of small wholesale groceries for reshipping products to the
smaller towns. As such houses were able to effect savings on
freight by getting their stock in carload lots and then sending
package freight only a relatively short distance to their cus-
tomers, the larger wholesale grocers at a greater distance, in
Chicago and St. Louis, were forced to follow this example
and establish branch houses in the more important cities of
the state. 11
Another development which has become even more far-
reaching in its results upon methods of retail distribution has
been the growth of the mail-order business. This may be
regarded as an Illinois product, for the two largest such houses
in the United States or in the world are located in Chicago,
which is the center of this business, although other large cities
within reach of Illinois have similar establishments. These
great houses supply practically all the necessaries and luxuries
10 Report on Trade and Commerce of St. Louis, 1910, p. 14-15.
11 Ibid., 1906, p. 55.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 119
of life directly to the consumer without the intervention of
any middleman or agents. They sell by catalogue, and orders
are sent to them by mail. A renewed impetus to this business
has been given by the establishment of the parcel post system,
which enables farmers living on rural routes to have mail-
order deliveries brought to their very door. So successful has
been this method of distribution that many manufacturers of
various kinds of goods are now following the example set by
the mail-order houses and are endeavoring to reach the con-
sumer directly by mail or otherwise, thus eliminating the profits
of the middleman. There are no statistics on these move-
ments; but they must be important among an agricultural
population like that of rural Illinois, which is now connected
with the great centers of commerce by several methods of
transportation. The days of the isolated farmhouse have
long passed.
By 1890 the state of Illinois had become well supplied
with railroad facilities, and during the following decade the
amount of new construction was reduced to a minimum. The
panic of 1893, while it was less disastrous to the railroads of
the state than had been that of 1873, P ut them to a severe
strain. It was difficult during the years of depression which
followed the panic to earn a satisfactory return upon the
existing capital, and new additions were consequently out of
the question. Indeed, the feeling gained ground that Illinois
already had enough railroads to supply her need for trans-
portation facilities. This view found clear expression in the
report of the railroad and warehouse commission for 1898:
" The State of Illinois is so thoroughly covered with a network
of railroads that we can not expect a great increase in the
future in the mileage of the main lines in the State. The com-
petition between all main points is now so strong that the
construction of new lines would be an unprofitable and reckless
investment." In order to prevent the duplication of existing
facilities by the building of unnecessary parallel roads, the
commission further recommended that authority be given them
120 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
to pass upon the advisability of the construction of any pro-
posed new road. 12 But the economic situation was more effec-
tive even than legislation in preventing unnecessary construc-
tion, and during this period the increase in mileage has been
due mainly to the building of branch lines or feeders by the
systems already in the field. 13
During the period between 1900 and the panic of 1907,
which again put a stoppage to further expansion, there was
considerable development in the coal fields of southern Illinois,
which were being tapped and exploited by all the more
important railroad systems in the state. New branch lines
and feeders were built, and many of the roads bought coal
lands and developed their own mines. The most important
of these coal carrying lines were the Illinois Central, the
Chicago and Eastern Illinois, the Chicago, Burlington and
Quincy, the Baltimore and Ohio Southwestern, and the Big
Four system.
Illinois was long the leading railroad state in the union in
respect to the number of miles of line, but in 1907 the primacy
was wrested from her by the still larger and more rapidly
developing state of Texas. 14 In 1914 Texas had 15,758
miles, or 6.2 per cent of the 252,230 miles in the whole United
States, while Illinois held second place with 12,140 miles or
4.8 per cent, and Pennsylvania was third with 11,634 miles
or 4.6 per cent. 15 This high rank is due not merely to the
large size of the state, but rather to the extent of the railway
net in proportion to the area covered. While there were in
1914 only 8.48 miles of line for each 100 square miles of
territory for the United States as a whole, in Illinois there
were 21.66 miles of line for a similar area. 16
Although there was only a moderate increase in the mileage
of Illinois railroads during this period, there was a very great
12 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1898, p. in, xiii; 1900,
p. iv.
13 See tables in appendix, p. 504-505.
14 Poor's Manual, 1907, p. vi.
15 Report on Statistics of Railways in the United States, 1914, p. 12.
l Ibid.
>-> i-> to i\j e>j to *
cntnpsp\vj^pooo
t t I ^-* M 4?
P S 5 > |3 C e S!
\
^
k
V
A
V
^
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 121
improvement in their construction and equipment. The sig-
nificant feature of American railroad building during the last
twenty-five years has been the rebuilding of many of the hastily
constructed early lines, and in no state has greater improve-
ment been made than in Illinois. The character of the traffic
which is carried by the railroads in this state heavy, bulky
commodities such as coal and grain and the further fact
that most of it is through traffic, have impressed upon the
Illinois lines a distinctive character. There has been a steady
increase in the weight of the rolling stock; this in turn has
resulted in greater tractive power, which, combined with the
denser traffic and improved organization, has made possible
much heavier train loads. Thus on the Chicago and Alton,
a typical Illinois road, the average train load has grown from
184 tons in 1885 to 418 in 1915. In 1912 the average train
load on the. Illinois Central was about 430 tons. 17
The heavier loads have in turn necessitated corresponding
improvements in track and bridges. Thus in 1871, of the
5,490 miles of track in Illinois, more than ninety per cent was
laid with iron rails weighing from thirty to fifty-six pounds
to the yard; by 1913 all but 118 of the 12,168 miles of track
were laid with steel rails weighing from sixty to one hundred
and ten pounds to the yard. In 1871 the road was rock bal-
lasted only in those places where trouble was caused during the
wet season, but in 1913, only about five per cent was ballasted
with earth and sand. In 1871 there were seventy-nine and
one-half miles of double main track, or about one-six-
tieth as many miles of double as of single track; in 1914 the
number of miles of second, third, and additional main
tracks was 3,145, or about one-fourth of the single main
track. 18
In 1875, in the 7,109 miles of railroad in the state, there
were fifteen stone arch bridges; in 1913, with an increase of
about seventy per cent in the mileage, there were in use 946
17 Poor's Manual, 1916, p. 1408 ; Report of the Illinois Central Railroad, 1912.
18 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1871, table " H " ; 1895,
p. xi; 1913, i: 15; Report of the Illinois Public Utilities Commission, 1914, 2:7.
.122 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
masonry and 3,103 iron and steel bridges, only ninety wooden
bridges remaining as a monument of older conditions. 19
These are only a few of the many improvements which
have been introduced. In addition, interlocking switching
devices and block signalling systems have been put into oper-
ation, curves and grades have been reduced, tracks have been
elevated, and other changes made. 20 As a result of these
improvements not only has the weight of the average
train load been greatly increased, but a much higher rate
of speed has been attained by both passenger and freight
trains.
As a result of these changes rates have been lowered,
traffic has greatly increased, and the markets have been greatly
extended. The extension of improved transportation facilities
into the great grain-growing northwest has brought that section
into closer competition with Illinois farmers and has resulted
in a gradual displacement of Illinois wheat by that of Minne-
sota and the Dakotas. Illinois farmers have consequently
been forced more and more into corn raising and more recently
into dairy farming and stock raising. 21 On the other hand,
these improvements have developed an enormous traffic in
other domestic products within the state, especially the prod-
ucts of the mines, forests, and factories. Between 1889 and
1913 the increase in the total amount of freight carried was
fourfold, which was much greater than the growth of the
population during the same period. The commerce in the
19 Report of the Illinois Public Utilities Commission, 1875, p. 300, 302; 1913,
p. 16.
20 The following statement will show the character of the improvements
that were being made: "The work of the betterment of the physical conditions
of the railroad properties of the State have gone steadily forward. Double tracks
are being laid to facilitate business, heavier rail sections are replacing the light
rails of former years, grade reductions, elimination of curvatures and the pur-
chase and placing in service of heavy equipment, both engines and cars of the
very best class for both passenger and freight service, which make the railroad
service of the State of Illinois the peer of any such service in this or any other
country." Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1903, p. 8.
21 Compare chapter in on agriculture. In 1869 Illinois ranked as the fore-
most wheat producing state in the union with a production of 30,128,405 bushels;
for the half decade, 1910-1914, the average annual production was 17,314,263, and
the state ranked about fourteenth. The production of corn increased from 129,-
921,395 bushels in 1869 to 320,111,081 in 1915, Illinois racking first in both years.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 123
products of the mines grew sixfold, those of the forests five-
fold, and manufactures over eightfold.
The figures upon which these statements are based contain
inaccuracies, but their essential correctness is evidenced by
other statistics of freight movement at particular points.
Peoria, which is a typical interior railway center, showed a
fourfold increase between 1888 and 1915, or practically the
same as that shown for the state as a whole. 22
The east and west traffic across southern Illinois may be
gauged by the freight crossing the Mississippi to and from
St. Louis. Between 1890 and 1914 the movement of freight
both into and out of the state increased about threefold, the
shipments out of the state remaining consistently larger. 23
It is not possible to present any statistics of the north and
south movement of freight across the state, but a couple of
estimates have been made that will serve as a guide. A state
committee on the deep waterway across Illinois estimated the
freight movement between Chicago and St. Louis at 20,000,-
ooo tons northward and 15,000,000 tons southward, or a total
of 35,000,000 tons annually. At about the same time the
federal Mississippi river commission, which was also investi-
gating the deep waterway project, stated that the freight which
then moved between these two cities was carried by three rail-
roads the Chicago and Alton, the Illinois Central, and the
Wabash and that during the year ending June 30, 1904,
the quantity of freight moved by these three roads from Chi-
cago to St. Louis was 449,115 tons and from St. Louis to
Chicago was 633,182 tons, a total of 1,082,297 tons for the
year in both directions. This they thought was a fair estimate
of this north and south traffic. 21 The vast discrepancy between
the two sets of figures serves to show how inaccurate a mere
guess upon such a subject may be and that the value of the
estimate in every case depends upon the motive of the one
making the estimate.
22 See table in appendix, p. 505.
23 See table in appendix, p. 506.
24 Report by the Mississippi River Commission, 1905, p. 15.
i2 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The total amount of freight carried in the state as a whole
showed a steady increase during this period, except for a slight
decline between 1902 and 1905. 25 After 1905 the increase
was especially rapid, the total freight tonnage almost doubling
in the next decade. The freight train mileage did not grow
so rapidly, but the number of tons carried one mile quadrupled
during the twenty-year period. This was due to the more
efficient utilization of plant and equipment, resulting from
heavier train loads and faster speed.
Much less important than the freight service, both in the
amount of rolling stock used for this service and the resulting
revenues to the railroads, is the passenger service. The
growth in this has not been so great as in the case of the freight
tonnage, but it has more than doubled in the past twenty
years. 26
One of the most interesting as well as important recent
developments in the transportation world has been the growth
of interurban electric railroads. Electric traction was first
applied to city street railways in 1888, but it was almost a
decade later that electric lines were built outside the city limits
between comparatively distant points. Since 1900, however,
there has been a very rapid development of these lines, not
only in Illinois but in almost all sections of the country.
The first electric roads in Illinois were constructed during
the later nineties. The first mention of them in the reports
of the railroad and warehouse commission was in that of 1899,
when 42.89 miles of "elevated and electric roads" were re-
ported in operation, but no distinction was made between the
two. A comparison with subsequent reports shows, however,
that of this total 10.50 miles consisted of electric surface lines.
This was the St. Louis, Belleville, and Suburban Railway Com-
pany, which therefore has the distinction of being the first road
of this kind in Illinois. A year later the Peoria and Pekin Ter-
25 See table in appendix, p. 56-
26 The freight revenue of Illinois railroads in 1913 was $147,262,069, while
the passenger revenue was $41,642,174. The number of freight cars in use was
966,830, and of passenger cars, 17,827. See tables in appendix, p. 504-505.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 125
minal Railway was opened for passenger business (April 10,
1900) ; six miles had been built for the Mississippi Valley
Transit Company; and a beginning was being made on the Col-
linsville, Caseyville, and East St. Louis Electric Railroad,
which by June 30, 1901, had a little over seven miles in opera-
tion. 27 During this last year the Chicago, Harvard, and
Geneva Lake Railway was opened.
After this the movement became more rapid, and the com-
panies began to multiply and the lines to stretch, out into the
rural districts between the larger cities. By 1903 there were
already two lines over fifty miles in length. The first line to
pass a length of 100 miles was the Aurora, Elgin, and Chicago
Railroad Company in I9O7. 28 In this same year a total length
of over 1,000 miles was attained by all the lines. Combina-
tion soon set in, and the separate lines began to be consolidated
into larger combinations. Of these the Illinois Traction
Company soon passed all the rest and by 1913 controlled 456
miles of line in Illinois. As a typical electric interurban system
this may be briefly described.
The Illinois Traction Company was organized in 1904
out of some twenty subsidiary companies. 29 Its longest direct
line is from Danville to East St. Louis, a distance of 227
miles. Springfield is the center of the system, and from here
the three branch lines radiate in all directions north to
Peoria (75 miles), east to Danville (131 miles), and south
to East St. Louis (97 miles). 30 Another division connects
Decatur with Bloomington (45 miles). All these divisions
are served with limited trains operated at high speed on a
two-hour headway and are equipped with parlor and sleeping
cars.
27 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1899, p. cxxi; 1900,
p. clxxix; 1901, p. 197.
28 Ibid., 1907, p. 286.
29 Street and Electric Railways, 1907.
30 The Illinois Traction Company first gained entrance to St. Louis in 1910
and its advent was hailed with joy by the people of that city, because it supplied
improved facilities for shipments of merchandise to Illinois towns, and alsc
afforded the opportunity for the people of these towns to make frequent shopping
trips to St. Louis. Report on Trade and Commerce of St. Louis, 1910, p. 68.
126 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The freight service of this system is also of real and grow-
ing importance to the territory it serves. It affords the sole
outlet for several coal mines along its route and serves over
one hundred coal mines which are also touched by the steam
roads which the system parallels. It has also developed a
considerable traffic in milk and grain and in general express
and package transportation. But the passenger traffic and
revenue far exceed the freight business in importance. 31
The rapid development of the interurban electric railway
has been due to several causes. 32 Travel by the interurban
is cheaper than by the steam railroads; it is more convenient,
owing both to the frequency of the service and to the more
convenient location of the interurban stations which are
usually situated in the heart of the shopping districts. And
finally many people are reached by the interurban who could
not use the steam roads. The great advantage possessed by
the electric lines is the possibility of variation of units of serv-
ice according to the amount and character of traffic, which en-
ables them to give a service which is both more frequent and
cheaper than that of the competing steam roads. The latter
have in many cases lost traffic to the interurbans, especially in
suburban traffic outside the larger cities. Passenger, freight,
mail, express, sleeping, and even funeral cars are run on the
longer routes. 33 The total number of passengers carried by
these roads has increased from 1,743,495 in 1899 to 137,390,-
295 in 1913.
The freight tonnage hauled by electric railways in Illinois
has grown in even greater ratio than the passenger traffic, hav-
ing increased from 614 tons in 1900 to 3,067,483 tons in
1913. Figures showing the various classes of freight are
available only from 1910 to I9I3, 34 but these show that the
transportation of bituminous coal far exceeded all other
freight in volume. The handling of parcels and light package
31 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1913, i: 138.
32 See table in appendix, p. 57-
33 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1905, p. 6.
34 Ibid., 1910-1913.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 127
freight in and out of the large cities is a business whose im-
portance is not adequately measured by statistics of tonnage,
but which is constantly growing. So too the transportation of
farm products, especially milk, from the rural districts to the
creameries and city markets has been an important one in the
dairy sections of the state.
The interurban electric lines have had an important effect
upon both passenger and freight rates of the steam roads, but
especially the former. In some cases the steam roads met the
competition of their new rivals by reducing fares, but for the
shorter distances they found it impracticable to meet the lower
expenses of operation of the electric lines and solved the prob-
lem by laying off a number of passenger trains. This has been
particularly noticeable on the roads serving Chicago. But
perhaps the most important effects of this new transportation
agency have been the breaking down of rural isolation, as it
has brought country districts into closer touch with the cultural
advantages to be found in cities and has facilitated travel and
commercial intercourse.
Railroad rates in Illinois have since 1871 been under the
control of a state commission, whose authority was generally
recognized by the roads after the first decade. Since 1887
rates between Illinois and points outside the state have come
under the jurisdiction of the federal interstate commerce com-
mission. During the period since 1 893, therefore, railroad rates
in Illinois have been fairly steady, and have shown none of the
wild fluctuations that characterized earlier periods. Both pas-
senger and freight rates have declined rather more than the
average rates for the United States and have reached a lower
level. 35
Schedules of maximum rates have been established from
time to time by the railroad and warehouse commission, of
which the first went into effect in 1874. The maximum passen-
ger rate of three cents a mile then fixed continued until 1907,
when it was reduced to two cents by legislative action. An at-
35 See table in appendix, p. 507-
128 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tempt in 1917 to raise the rates to two and one-half cents a
mile failed. 36
The schedules of freight rates fixed by the commission were
likewise placed high enough to give considerable latitude to the
railroad companies. Changes have been effected in the official
schedules chiefly through variations in the classification of
freight, which have been made frequently. In 1894 a new gen-
eral classification was adopted by the commission to correct the
inequalities under which Illinois merchants and shippers were
suffering in their competition with merchants in neighboring
states. It was shown that rates from Cincinnati, Toledo, De-
troit, and other cities to interior points in Illinois were less than
those from Chicago, even though in some cases the hauls were
longer. Reductions were accordingly made on about one thou-
sand articles and the discriminations complained of were cor-
rected. Again in 1906 as a result of complaints of high charges
on the part of shippers, a flat reduction of twenty per cent was
ordered by the commission on classes one to five (chiefly mer-
chandise) and a graduated scale of reduction on classes six to
ten (other commodities). 37 Minor reductions and changes
have been made every year and sometimes several times in a
single year as occasion warranted.
Reductions in rates are usually accompanied by such an in-
crease in traffic that net earnings are not adversely affected, and
this has been true in general of Illinois railroads. The prosper-
ity of these lines received a blow in 1893, however, from the
serious effects of which no artificial stimulation of traffic could
save them. The panic of 1893 was caused by an overinvest-
ment of fixed capital, largely in premature railroad construc-
tion. Liquidation and an adjustment of values was inevitable.
In Illinois conditions were made worse by labor troubles and
crop failures which reduced the amount of traffic available. The
general reduction in rates ordered by the commission in 1894
36 The table on page 507 In the appendix shows that the actual rates were
lower than the legal maxima.
37 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1895, p. xi; Special
Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1906.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 129
came in the midst of the period of depression, but it helped
rather than hurt the railroads for it enabled Illinois merchants
and manufacturers to reach markets from which hitherto they
had been virtually excluded by discriminatory rates.
Beginning about 1897 the lean years came to an end and
there set in a "wonderful and unparalleled activity in railroad
business," which continued almost without interruption for the
next decade. 38 Freight tonnage and passenger traffic showed
astonishing growth, which was attended by marked prosperity
of the railroads. This revival was curtailed temporarily by
the panic of 1907, the effects of which were "reflected very
largely in the business of the railroads of the State." 39 Pas-
senger and freight revenues both declined, but the depres-
sion was only momentary, and the normal expansion of the
country soon restored the roads on a sound financial foot-
ing. Net revenues continued to increase to 1913, but the fol-
lowing year saw a decline owing to the rapidly growing costs
of operation.
The railroads insisted that a general advance in rates of five
per cent on all classes of commodities was necessary, and this
was granted them in 1914 by the public utilities commission,
which in this year superseded the railroad and warehouse com-
mission. Protested by the shippers and commercial associations
of the state, this advance was suspended until its merits could
be passed upon more carefully by the commission, 40 but in July
the railroads were authorized to increase rates from Chicago
to points in the central freight association territory and in De-
cember to points in eastern trunk line territory. 41 In 1917 the
commission granted a freight rate increase of fifteen cents a ton
on coal and coke for one year ending October 15, 191853 five
38 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1899, p. v. Only in
one year, 1904, did the net earnings and dividends of the railroads in Illinois
fail to show an increase over the previous year, and in this case the decline was
a slight one.
39 Ibid., 1908, p. 6.
40 The five per cent rate case was the most important subject with which
the new commission has yet had to deal. Opinions and Orders of the Public
Utilities Commission of Illinois, 1915, 2:20.
41 Report of the Trade and Commerce of Chicago, 1914, p. xxv.
i 3 o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
per cent increase was also allowed on a large number of other
commodities. 42
The hearing and adjusting of complaints proved to be one
of the most important duties of the railroad and warehouse
commission and has been taken over by the public utilities com-
mission. Undertaken originally as a temporary expedient the
policy of arbitrating complaints was found so satisfactory that
in 1893 tne commission adopted formal rules of practice to
govern the procedure in the trial of complaints. 43 Many dis-
agreements were settled without formal trial, and in the formal
cases the railroads showed a willingness to accept the decisions
of the commission. Complaints over discrimination were heard
frequently in the nineties, later they were directed against ex-
cessive charges for switching loaded cars and other forms of
extortion; and today they cover a multitude of grievances most
of which, however, still concern the question of rates.
The powers of the commission were materially enlarged in
1911 by giving them control over all common carriers in the
state, except street railways, in addition to their original control
over steam railroads and warehouses. The act of 1911 de-
fined common carrier to include express companies, steamboat
lines, private car line companies, sleeping car companies, fast
freight line companies, and every agency for public use in the
conveyance of persons or property within the state. At the
same time the power of inquiry into the business management
of all common carriers was enlarged. The first reports of these
companies were made to the commission the following year,
and one of the first acts of the commission under its enlarged
powers was to reduce express rates. 44 As a result of the wid-
ened scope of these activities the railroad and warehouse com-
mission, after an honorable record of forty-four years, was
superseded on January I, 1914, by the state public utilities
commission.
Railroad consolidation was a marked characteristic of rail-
42 Chicago Tribune, October 10, 1917.
43 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1893, p. 6, 153-159.
44 Ibid., 1912, p. 12.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 131
way development in Illinois during this period. It was the
result in part of a general movement toward large scale produc-
tion, with its resulting economies. Between about 1896 and
1901 the larger lines in the state bought the smaller lines, often
at receivers' sales of bankrupt roads, and made them divisions
of their own systems. In part, however, the movement toward
consolidation was the result of legislative acts and judicial
decisions rather than purely economic forces. Pooling had
been forbidden by the interstate commerce act of 1887, but
the railroads in their efforts to prevent competition had made
rate agreements. These were permitted until 1897 when the
supreme court in the cases against the Joint Traffic and Trans-
Missouri Freight Associations held that the Sherman law of
1890 applied to railroads and therefore declared such agree-
ments to be illegal.
Since concerted action by independent railroads either in
fixing or maintaining rates was now made illegal, a decided im-
petus was given to the movement toward consolidation. But
this now took a slightly different form from that which had pre-
viously prevailed. The stronger systems purchased a control-
ling interest in the stock of- other lines and were thus able to
harmonize the rate policies of the hitherto competing roads. A
common method of financing such a purchase has been for the
acquiring company to issue its bonds in exchange for the stock
of the acquired company. A few typical instances of the more
important consolidations in Illinois may be given.
The Illinois Central, which began operations in 1856 with
705 miles of road between Chicago and Cairo and between
Centralia and Dubuque, had increased its mileage by construc-
tion, purchase, and lease to 2,888 in 1893. Since that period it
has continued the same policy until by January i, 1917, it con-
trolled 4,825 miles, almost half (2,287 miles) being controlled
by stock ownership and a third (1,555 miles) by outright pur-
chase. In 1 893 it purchased a controlling interest in the Chesa-
peake, Ohio, and Southwestern and some of the affiliated com-
panies. In 1896 it obtained control by lease of the St. Louis,
132 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Alton, and Terre Haute, which in turn held by lease six other
short lines in southern Illinois, thereby adding 239 miles to its
system. In 1899 the line from Springfield to East St. Louis,
formerly a part of the St. Louis, Peoria, and Northern, was
purchased, and also the Indiana division of the Peoria, Decatur.
& Evansville. Two years later the Evansville and Mattoon
line was absorbed, and in 1902 eight small lines were added.
The following year six other small lines were absorbed. Other
purchases were made in 1905 and 1908. 43 Most of these lines
were in Illinois and are now operated as divisions of the Illinois
Central system.
The Chicago and Alton Railway Company was incorpo-
rated in 1900 as a holding company to lease the property of the
Chicago and Alton railroad and to purchase an interest in the
St. Louis, Peoria, and Northern. This latter was itself the
result of a consolidation in 1896 of the St. Louis and Eastern,
the St. Louis and Peoria, and the North and South railroads,
all of which were in receivers* hands at the time. In 1906 the
" railway " company and the " railroad " company were merged,
assuming the name of the latter. In 1907 the Toledo, St. Louis,
and Western acquired control of the Chicago and Alton through
the purchase of a majority of the preferred and common stock
of that company. 46 Here is a case in which a line of 450 miles
controls a larger one of 1,052 miles. As the acquiring road is at
present in the hands of a receiver it is difficult to say what the
outcome will be.
The Chicago and Eastern Illinois Railroad Company was
chartered in 1894 as a consolidation of an earlier company of
the same name and the Chicago and Indiana Coal Railway Com-
pany. In 1897 the Chicago, Paducah, and Memphis line was
purchased; in 1899 the Eastern Illinois and Missouri River,
the Indiana Block Coal, the Evansville, Terre Haute, and Chi-
cago, and the Eastern Illinois and St. Louis railroad compa-
nies were absorbed. The two latter roads together with the
46 Poor's Manual, 1897, p. 461; 1911, p. 808-809; 1917, p. 1269.
46 Ibid., 1906, p. 324; 1917, p. 1077.
TRADE AND TRANSPORTATION 133
Evansville Belt Railway Company were consolidated in 1911
under the name of the Chicago and Eastern Railroad. 47 By
these consolidations the mileage of the system has been prac-
tically doubled.
The examples of consolidation just given, which are for the
most part of lines bought outright, leased, or controlled by stock
ownership, do not, however, indicate sufficiently the unification
of interests which has been taking place. Other important
alliances have been effected by joint ownership on the part of
two different systems, as illustrated by the joint control of the
Chicago, Burlington, and Quincy by the Great Northern and
the Northern Pacific. As the first named line in turn owns or
controls sixteen other lines some of which are owned in com-
mon with still other roads the intricacy of modern railroad
interrelationships becomes apparent. The significant fact is
that most of the Illinois railroads have become parts of great
national systems, one of them over nine thousand miles in
length. The difficulty of enforcing competition or of preventing
rate agreements under such circumstances becomes at once
apparent.
The rapid increase in railroad service has been attended
with a concomitant growth of accidents, though not in the same
proportion. In the case of passenger traffic, where improved
safety devices, steel cars, and other safeguards have been most
widely introduced, there has been a decided falling off in the
proportion of those killed and injured. The same thing is true
of the group of "others" who are neither passengers nor em-
ployees. A large proportion of the accidents to these persons
occurred at crossings, and since about 1898 the railroad and
warehouse commission began energetically to work for track
elevation or the more general installation of safety devices at
these points, an effort which has met with steady though some-
times grudging response. 48 Accidents at grade crossings be-
came especially frequent, after the development of electric
47 Ibid., 1908, p. 466; 1917, p. 637.
48 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1898, p. ix, 1899, p.
ix, 1900, p. xi., 1901, p. 8.
i 3 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
interurban roads began, at those points where these crossed the
existing lines of steam railroads.
It is, however, the group of railway employees which has
paid the largest toll in life and limb in response to the increas-
ing demand for service. 49 The great increase in the number of
employees reported as injured in the last five years would seem
to be the result of more careful reporting of such accidents as a
result of the adoption of compensation rather than a real in-
crease, for the number of fatal injuries shows only a normal in-
crease. The proportion of employees killed in Illinois has
fallen from one in every 750 in 1880 to one in 496 in I9i3. 50
But the record for Illinois is worse than that for the whole
United States, being one in every 461 for the state in 1909 as
against one in every 576 for the union. 51 The similar figures
for non-fatal injuries are one in 25 as against one in 20; in this
respect Illinois makes a better showing than the country as a
whole. The high water mark seems to have been reached in
1913 for fatal injuries and in the following year for non-fatal
accidents. The year 1915 recorded a decided and gratifying
decrease in both classes of accidents, which reflect better care
on the part of the railroads and of the commission. 52
49 See table in appendix, p. 508.
50 Report of the Railroad and Warehouse Commission, 1880, p. 12; 1913,
1:17, 85.
51 These statistics are for 1909, the last year in which they can be obtained
for the country as a whole. Report of the Statistics of Railways in the United
States, 1909, p. 106.
62 See table in appendix, p. 508.
VII. WATER TRANSPORTATION AND ROADS
THE history of water transportation in Illinois during the
past fifty years stands in striking contrast with that of
railroad transportation, as it has been characterized by a steady
decline in volume and importance. Today the lake commerce
is the only important branch of water-borne commerce within
the state. The river and canal traffic is practically a thing of
the past, except in the case of a few heavy and cheap commodi-
ties which cannot pay high freight charges. The history of water
transportation in Illinois for the last twenty-five years may be
divided into that of river, canal, and lake commerce.
The Ohio river trade is still of some importance at a few
Illinois towns, in spite of a steady decline. It is difficult to give
any comparative statistics, as the data for the earlier period
were in terms of value and those for more recent years are given
for amounts. In 1905 Mound City was the most important
purely Ohio river port, with receipts of 172,570 tons and ship-
ments of 405 tons. Other towns were Shawneetown (total
receipts and shipments, 76,691 tons), Metropolis (43,308),
Brookport (17,825), Rosiclare (16,200), Elizabethtown (13,-
450), Cave in Rock (10,400), Golconda (1,756), and Ham-
letsburg (no). 1 In all these towns the receipts were much
larger than the shipments, seeming to show that they were
primarily collecting points for material which was used for
local manufactures or was shipped on to other points by rail.
Cairo is today, as it always has been, the most important
commercial river town in Illinois, although its commerce has
decreased greatly. Its situation, at the junction of the Missis-
1 Report of Commissioner of Corporations on Transportation by Water in
United States, part 2, p. 282.
135
136 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
sippi and Ohio rivers, gives it an advantage which it was
thought at one time would make it the leading commercial city
in the state, if not of the west. In 1905 the receipts from both
the Mississippi and Ohio rivers were 268,741 tons and the ship-
ments were 127,200 tons, or a total of 395,941 tons. 2 Nine-
tenths of this freight was received from upstream, and consisted
of coal, sand, stone, and other freight such as logs, lumber, and
railroad ties, which were received for local manufacture at
Cairo or for shipment by rail to other points. 3
On the Mississippi river between Cairo and St. Louis there
are several river towns of considerable importance, each of
which has more or less river trade; but the St. Louis, Iron
Mountain, and Southern Railway parallels the river for a large
part of the distance and has secured most of the traffic on the
Illinois side. Moreover, the navigation of the river has for
many years been very difficult owing to the irregularity of the
stage of the water. 4 One cause of this difficulty is the compara-
tively great slope on this stretch of the river, while another is
the great influx of sediment from the Missouri river. Prac-
tically all the freight now handled on this stretch of the Missis-
sippi is local freight to or from the river towns.
On the upper Mississippi, railroad competition has been
particularly keen for the past twenty-five years and has affected
both the extent and character of the river trade. The bulk of
the commerce received at the river ports has therefore consisted
of stone, gravel, sand, and similar cheap heavy commodities,
and rafts of logs brought down from the northern forests to be
manufactured at these cities into various kinds of lumber. 5
Thus, during the year 1894, the four cities of Fulton, Moline,
Rock Island, and Quincy manufactured over 148 million feet
of lumber, more than 35 million shingles, and nearly 33 million
2 Report of Commissioner of Corporations on Transportation by Water in
United States, part 2, p. 282.
3 Transportation by Water, 1906, p. 184.
4 The variation in the Mississippi river at Grafton, Illinois, below the mouth
of the Illinois river, is 29.6 feet; below Cairo and the mouth of the Ohio river
it is 45.6 feet. See " Preliminary Report of the United States National Waterways
Commission," Senate Documents, 61 congress, 2 session, number 301, p. 7.
6 Report on Transportation by Water in United States, part 2, p. 183-184.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 137
laths. 6 This lumber manufacture has since declined owing to
the establishment of sawmills nearer the northern forests.
The diminishing traffic and increasing difficulties of naviga-
tion are reflected in the marked decrease in the average tonnage
of river vessels. While the number of steam vessels docu-
mented in Illinois ports increased from 72 in 1895 to 80 in 1900,
and to 137 in 1906, their average tonnage declined from 115
in 1895 to 78 in 1900, and to 56 in 1906. This clearly shows an
adaptation of the boats to the demands of the service and the
conditions of navigation.
The Illinois river flows through the heart of the agricul-
tural region of the state and, with the Illinois and Michigan
canal, forms a continuous waterway for small vessels from
Lake Michigan at Chicago to the Mississippi river. The peo-
ple of Illinois have been interested in keeping open this water-
way across the state, because of the influence it would exert upon
railway freight rates between Chicago and St. Louis and inter-
mediate points. Since about 1876 the state of Illinois and the
federal government have carried on the work of improvement
jointly, with a view to creating a navigable route from the Mis-
sissippi to the Great Lakes. A lock and dam at La Grange,
seventy-nine miles from the mouth of the river, were completed
in 1890 and another at Kampsville, thirty-one miles from the
mouth of the river, in 1894. Up to June 30, 1906, the federal
government had expended $1,504,748 on these works. Since
1907 these operations have been extended over the upper sec-
tion of the river as far as La Salle where the Illinois and Michi-
gan canal connects with the river, forming a through route for
small boats to Chicago and Lake Michigan. 7
The building of the locks and dams at La Grange and
Kampsville gave promise of satisfactory navigation on the Illi-
nois river at all times, as it was believed that a stage of water
would be permanently secured which would afford as deep a
channel as that of the Mississippi river below the Illinois to
6 Report on Trade and Commerce of St. Louis, 1906, p. 169.
7 Transportation by Water, 1906, p. 169; Report of Commissioner of Cor-
porations on Transportation by Water in United States, part i, p. 51-52.
i 3 8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Alton, at least until that section of the Mississippi should be
further improved. After the completion of these improve-
ments there was an increase in the number of steamers plying
between the Illinois river and St. Louis, the number growing
from nine in 1889 to fourteen in i899. 8 But many of these
were used merely to tow barges and canal boats, which carried
sixty-nine per cent of the total freight on the Illinois river in
1906. The commerce was mostly local and consisted of grain
and general merchandise. Between 1889 and 1906 the total
freight shipments fell off from 180,264 tons to 105,826 tons,
or a loss of forty-one per cent. 10
Few states can boast a finer system of navigable rivers than
Illinois, bounded on one side by the "Father of Waters" and
on another by the mighty Ohio, while the Illinois river cuts
through the very heart of the state. Yet few states exhibit a
more complete disregard of the facilities for water transpor-
tation which nature has placed at its very door. Partly respon-
sible for this is the fact that these streams run, on the whole,
north and south, while the principal trade and commerce of
Illinois, since the early years of statehood, moves from west to
east and return. Partly also the difficulties of navigation in
the rivers the seasonal variations in depth and flow, the pres-
ence of sediment and shifting sand bars and the cost of improve-
ment are to blame for the small use of these streams.
But perhaps the strongest reason of all for their neglect has
been the rapid development of the railway net. There was not
traffic enough for both railway and river, and in the competi-
tion between these two agencies the former completely routed
its rival. The railroads offered certain real advantages, and
they were eagerly seized upon by a people impatient of delay
and anxious to bring the latent resources of the country into
quickest possible use. To this neglect of the rivers the rail-
roads themselves contributed materially by their unwillingness
8 Report on Trade and Commerce of St. Louis, 1890, p. 79-80; 1899, p.
132-134.
9 Transportation by Water, 1906, p. 182.
10 " Preliminary Report of the United States National Waterways Commis-
sion," Senate Documents, 61 congress, 2 session, number 301, p. 5.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 139
to cooperate with the steamers in the transshipment of freight
or the establishment of joint facilities. The rivers have been
regarded as enemies of the railways rather than as complemen-
tary to them. It may be that in the future, when the transpor-
tation needs of the state have transcended the ability of the rail-
roads to meet them, the rivers will again be called upon to serve
the people as they did one hundred years ago.
If the story of river transportation has been one of neglect,
that of the treatment of the canals has been one of indifference.
The canal traffic of Illinois is carried through three artificial
waterways the Illinois and Michigan canal, the Chicago sani-
tary and ship canal, and the Hennepin canal.
There was a steady decline in the amount of traffic on the
Illinois and Michigan canal down to I899- 11 But in 1900
there was a sudden drop to 121,759 an ^ st '^ lower levels were
reached in the succeeding seven years. Since 1907 there has
been an increase. This is due to the use of this canal for a short
distance by boats passing through the Chicago drainage canal.
The clearances, miles run, and receipts from tolls all continued
to decline steadily. The last feature is ,a very serious one and
has necessitated the payment of a large deficit year after year
out of state funds. Traffic has been increased by reductions in
rates, but the increase has not sufficed to prevent a steady de-
cline in the revenues. Since 1878 the canal has ceased perma-
nently to pay even the expenses of operation and mainte-
nance.
The decline of the canal to its present position has been due
to several causes. The most obvious is, of course, the competi-
tion of the railroads, which are more conveniently located and
have better terminal facilities, which are constantly being im-
proved while those of the canal are not. Rate discriminations
against the canal users, heavy elevator charges and expenses for
rehandling grain shipped via the canal, and similar factors put
the canal at a disadvantage. And finally the lack of all better-
11 For a table of traffic on the Illinois and Michigan canal, 1890-1915, see
appendix, p. 509.
140 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ments on the canal to adapt it to modern traffic conditions has
made it impossible to use it for any but local trade.
In spite of its steady decline to a position almost of useless-
ness the Illinois and Michigan canal still exerts a considerable
influence upon railroad rates at competitive points, while in the
past its power in reducing rates was very great From the date
of its opening to December i, 1915, the canal carried 74,031,-
104 tons of freight. During the same period $6,631,007 were
received in tolls as against $5,391,107 expended for mainte-
nance, repairs, and operation. 12 Although it has not proven to
be the great source of revenue that it was hoped it might be and
is today a source of expense to the state, it must be regarded as
having proved on the whole a good investment for the people
of the state of Illinois. The traffic on this canal has consisted
chiefly of heavy cheap commodities like sand and stone. In
1906 the total commerce amounted to 446,080 tons. 13
Parallel with the Illinois and Michigan canal is the new
Chicago sanitary and ship canal, constructed under authority
of the state by the trustees of the sanitary district of Chicago.
The main channel from Robey street, Chicago, to Lockport
was opened in 1900. It is twenty-eight miles long and twenty-
two feet deep. The total cost has been about $42,000,000. Its
primary purpose is to protect the waters of Lake Michigan
from sewage pollution, but its dimensions are large enough for
lake vessels.
Since the building of this canal there has been persistent
and determined agitation for the construction of a deep water-
way from the lakes to the gulf. The drainage canal, together
with the Illinois river, furnishes an excellent beginning for
such a plan. A survey made by a federal board of engineers
in 1902 proposed the building of short canals and the improve-
ment of the Illinois river by the federal government from Lock-
12 Putnam, The Illinois and Michigan Canal, 124. These figures do not
include the sums received from rentals, leases, and privileges, which are consid-
erable, nor the interest on the investment. See also Report of the Illinois Canal
Commissioners, 1914, p. 8.
13 Report of Commissioner of Corporations on Transportation by Water in
United States, part 2, p. 290.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 141
port, the present terminus of the drainage canal, to Utica.
Thus far, however, no action has been taken.
The state of Illinois has proceeded somewhat farther in at-
tempting to realize the proposed program. A bond issue of
twenty million dollars for the purpose of improving the water-
way from the western terminus of the Chicago drainage canal
to Utica and to construct power plants was approved by the
people on November 3, I9o8. 14 Legal complications delayed
the beginning of the work, and before it could be started a new
administration came into control of the state government, who
thought that a less deep and expensive channel would be suffi-
cient. The new plan contemplates an eight-foot channel instead
of one of fourteen feet, and to carry this out the Illinois water-
way commission was created with authority to make this im-
provement at a cost not to exceed $5, 000,000. 15
In support of this more modest plan it is urged that there is
no use in building a deep waterway within the state of Illinois
so long as the Mississippi river remains unimproved, and there
is no likelihood that its channel will be deepened by the federal
government in the immediate future. It is also stated that much
of the traffic which would use the deeper channel could be accom-
modated by the shallower one, and the difference would not
justify the expenditure of the larger sum necessary to secure
a fourteen-foot waterway. 16 Further expenditures for this
work, however, seem indefinitely postponed by the entrance of
the United States into the European war on April 6, 1917.
The Hennepin canal was completed in 1907. This extends
from the Illinois river at Great Bend, about one and three-
fourths miles from Hennepin, by way of Bureau creek valley to
Rock river, at the mouth of Green river, thence by slack water
in Rock river, and a canal around the lower rapids at Milan,
to the Mississippi. A report of the United States board of
engineers states that as a through route between Lake Michigan
14 Report on Trade and Commerce of St. Louis, 1908, p. 58.
15 The chief of engineers, United States army, stated that in his opinion an
eight-foot channel would be adequate. Engineering News, 61:691; Laws of
1915, P- 18-35.
16 See Putnam, The Illinois and Michigan Canal, 149-150.
142 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
and the Mississippi river the canal will be of comparative unim-
portance until improvements have been made on the Illinois
river between Lockport and La Salle. 17 No reliable statistics
on the traffic of this canal are available.
The lake commerce of Illinois resolves itself practically into
the commerce of Chicago, as it all passes through this port.
Local traffic on the Great Lakes is comparatively insignificant,
most of the commerce moved being carried from one end of the
lake system to the other. The principal receipts at Chicago
consist of iron ore which is mined in the Lake Superior region
and of lumber and coal, while the chief exports are grain and
flour and other mill products. 18 There has recently been a
notable increase in the amount of package freight received at
and shipped from Chicago by lake, and with proper terminal
facilities a still further increase may be looked for.
Disregarding the fluctuations which appear from year to
year the impression derived from a study of the flour and grain
shipments over a period of twenty years is one of gradual de-
cline in the volume of this branch of lake commerce. 19 In part
this is attributable to the diversion of the grain trade to the rail-
roads, and in part to the growth of other important grain mar-
kets in the northwest which have become very successful rivals
of Chicago in attracting this trade.
As carriers of flour the railroads have distinct advantages
over the lake vessels, because of the factors of time, cost, de-
lay, insurance, and similar items. In 1894 the lake shipments
amounted to almost half of all flour shipped east, but this pro-
portion sank to ten per cent in 1904; since that date there has
been a slow increase until today the lake boats carry about one-
third. In the contest for the wheat traffic the lake carriers have
been more successful, their shipments amounting to about two-
thirds. Corn shipments as a whole have declined, as more corn
has been used near the points of production in stock feeding and
17 Report of Commissioner of Corporations on Transportation by Water in
United States, part i, p. 52, part 2, p. 288, 290.
"Tunell, Statistics of Lake Commerce, n.
10 For table see appendix, p. 509.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 143
for the manufacture of corn products and distilled liquors.
The proportion shipped via the lake route has also fallen off
from about two-thirds of all in 1894 to one-third at present. In
the movement of oats the railroads have always maintained a
supremacy, their share of the traffic having increased from fifty
per cent in 1897 to ninety-seven and one-half per cent in 1915.
On the whole one may hazard the generalization that the
rail traffic from Chicago has remained fairly steady, showing in
general a normal growth from year to year. The lake traffic on
the other hand has been much more fluctuating, increasing when
large crops have created an extra demand for shipping facilities
and falling off when changes in conditions of production or mar-
keting have decreased the demand or have diverted the traffic
to other centers than Chicago. Lake shipments of flour and
grain as a whole have fallen from fifty-five per cent of all in
1894 to less than twenty per cent in 1915.
The value of the lakes to Chicago commerce cannot be ade-
quately measured, however, merely by citing figures of traffic
carried. Quite as important has been the effect of the lake
route in keeping down railroad rates. In fact this restraint has
been mutual, and the railroads in turn have served to lower lake
rates and to stimulate improvements in shipping facilities to
keep pace with similar improvements on the railroads. As a
result of this competition the cheapest rail rates in the world for
grain are the rates upon grain shipped from Chicago to New
York. 20
The principal receipts at Chicago by lake are of a very dif-
ferent character from those which constitute the shipments.
Instead of grain the chief articles are iron ore, coal, lumber,
salt, and similar commodities. 21 Iron ore is the principal com-
modity moved upon the Great Lakes and forms the bulk of the
east bound traffic. This ore is obtained from the Lake Superior
region, and is shipped to Lake Erie ports and in smaller meas-
ure to ports on southern Lake Michigan. Very little iron ore is
20 For table see appendix, p. 510.
21 For table see appendix, p. 510.
i 4 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
being or has been shipped from the upper lakes by rail because
it cannot bear the heavy railroad charges. In 1900, for in-
stance, out of a total of 19,059,393 tons shipped, only 489,078
tons went by rail. 22 The receipts of iron ore at Chicago, includ-
ing South Chicago, have increased very steadily since 1895.
Most of the ore goes to South Chicago, which is the center of
the iron and steel industry of Illinois, by way of the Calumet
river.
Receipts of coal by lake at Chicago have fluctuated, but on
the whole have shown an increase. In comparison with rail re-
ceipts, however, they have made up a steadily diminishing pro-
portion. The reasons for this are obvious. Eastern coal
shipped by lake is now usually carried to Superior or Duluth in
order that the ore boats may not return empty. On the other
hand Chicago has received an ever-increasing amount of coal
from recently opened mines in southern Illinois and Indiana,
which necessarily reaches the city by rail.
Lumber receipts have steadily declined as the northern for-
ests have been depleted or have been cut back from the lake
front. Recently there has been a notable increase in the amount
of package freight received at and shipped from Chicago by
lake, and with proper terminal facilities a large increase in this
class of business may be looked for. During the season the
local shipment of fruit is important. The long distance freight
consists of miscellaneous merchandise. The shipments show a
growth parallel with the receipts, averaging about half as much
as the receipts.
The lake traffic of Chicago, including South Chicago, as a
whole has barely held its own during this period. In 1894 it
amounted to 8,646,133 tons, and in 1915 to 10,227,830 tons
and has remained at about the latter figure for a number of
years. As between Chicago and South Chicago the latter has
steadily gained at the expense of the former, especially since the
development of the iron ore traffic. In 1906 South Chicago led
for the first time with 5 1.7 per cent of the whole. A compari-
22 Report of the Industrial Commission, 19:473.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 145
son of the total tonnage of Chicago's lake traffic with that of
other lake ports also shows that since 1904 Chicago has been
surpassed by the lake commerce of Buffalo, Duluth, Superior,
and Cleveland, though the value of the total commerce of
Chicago exceeds that of any other Lake port. 23
Many reasons have been given for this stationary condi-
tion of Chicago's lake trade, and much of the blame has been
placed upon the inadequacy of the Chicago river and harbor
and upon the lack of proper terminal facilities for handling the
freight. The harbor of Chicago consists of the Chicago and
Calumet rivers, with their branches, and of the outer harbor
of Chicago, inclosed by a breakwater. This outer harbor is
mainly a protection to the Chicago river and is little used for
commercial purposes, being today a harbor of refuge and a
roadstead for small vessels and yachts. The most important
part of the harbor is the south branch of the Chicago river, a
narrow and tortuous stream, which is moreover obstructed with
many bridges causing much delay and adding to the cost of
transportation. In 1910 it was said there were about fifty
bridges on the Chicago river and about forty on the Calumet. 24
Agitation for improved harbor facilities was begun in 1908
when Mayor Busse sent a special message to the city council
calling attention to the decline of the shipping trade of Chicago,
which he claimed was due wholly to the inconvenience and in-
adequacy of harbor facilities. He recommended that a commis-
sion be appointed to consider this question as well as that of rail-
road terminals. In accordance with this suggestion the Chicago
harbor commission was appointed.
The commission in its report the following year recom-
mended that the two branches of the Chicago river be widened
and straightened, that the bridges be improved and the bridge
hours be modified. The obstacles to establishing adequate har-
bor facilities in the river were so great and apparently insuper-
able that a majority of the commission favored a plan for
23 Jones, Ports of the United States, 348 et seq.
24 Report of Commissioner of Corporations on Transportation by Water in
United States, part 2, p. 220, part 3, p. 22.
146 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
establishing a harbor along the lake front, of which very little
use had hitherto been made either for industrial or commercial
purposes. Little has been done, however, in the way of carry-
ing out these suggestions. 25
By act of July i, 1911, the legislature authorized the city
council of Chicago to proceed with the work of harbor improve-
ment, and acting under this authorization the subcommittee on
harbor development held meetings and issued a further report.
In this they urged the construction of a harbor immediately
north of the mouth of the Chicago river, which they thought
would best serve present needs and would care for the develop-
ment of commerce for a decade. 26 In accordance with this
suggestion the city has since constructed the first of a series of
five piers on the lake front a short distance above the mouth
of the river. 27
The commerce of the Calumet region has grown greatly in
the last decade and is destined to increase still more. The mis-
takes made upon the Chicago river have to a large extent been
avoided in the development of the Calumet. The needs of Chi-
cago for better harbor facilities cannot, however, be met by the
improvement of this river, for its growth has been due to the
development of the iron and steel industry and the consequent
receipts of iron ore. Return cargoes are obtained at Chicago,
and hence this city must establish its own harbor with adequate
terminal facilities. It cannot depend upon South Chicago.
The practically stationary character of the lake trade of
Chicago during the last twenty-five years is on the whole due
to changes in centers of production and methods of marketing
rather than to the inadequacy of harbor facilities. The de-
cline of the grain, coal, and lumber traffic is due to natural
causes quite unrelated to conditions in Chicago. The increase
in the iron ore traffic has inured to the benefit of South Chicago
and Gary rather than to Chicago itself. Package, freight, and
passenger business seem to offer the most hopeful future for
25 Report of the Chicago Harbor Commission, 1909, viii, 40 et seq.
26 Report of the Sub-Committee on Harbor Development, 17.
27 Jones, Ports of the United States, 351.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 147
the city, but adequate facilities must be provided for them if
they are to show a healthy growth.
The excellence of other avenues of transportation in Illinois
in the early period the waterways and later the railways
has always exerted a retarding influence upon the improvement
of roads in the state. Even as late as 1894 these channels of
trade remained substantially as they were fifty years before.
The need for better roads in Illinois, which had lagged far
behind other states in this respect, was recognized by lead-
ing men in the state. 28 But many persons, especially the farm-
ers, were deterred from indorsing the good roads project be-
cause they were alarmed by their magnitude and expense.
Moreover at this particular time the panic of 1893 and the
ruinously low prices for agricultural products prevented any
movement toward improvement.
By 1896, however, interest began to be renewed in the sub-
ject, which took the form of building short experimental
stretches of hard roads. A novel experiment was the building
of a steel wheelway near Joliet by Mr. Abel Bliss. This was
followed by other similar sporadic experiments, but finally in
1 90 1 a thorough trial was given the scheme on a track built near
Chicago from designs prepared in the office of road inquiry
of the United States department of agriculture. The wheel-
way did not stand up well under the heavy traffic to which it
was subjected. Since then this method has been abandoned.
Professor I. O. Baker, of the University of Illinois, stated that
the result of experiments with this type of roadway showed
them to be more expensive and less effective than a good
macadam road. The first brick pavement was built this year in
Monmouth township, Warren county, 29 and the following year
the same town constructed five miles of macadam roads. The
continued interest in the subject was also shown by its discus-
sion at the conventions of engineers, surveyors, farmers* insti-
tutes, the Grange, and similar organizations.
28 See messages of the outgoing and incoming governors in January, 1893*
House Journal, 1893, 34-35, 54-
29 Engineering News, 36:289; 47:365-366.
i 4 8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
But numerous factors were working against the good roads
movement at this time, which delayed if they did not defeat it.
Many people thought any expenditure for this purpose was un-
necessary as the electric interurban railroads, which were just
then being introduced, were destined to replace hard roads in
the more important rural districts. The local highway officials
were bitterly opposed to any changes in road administration
which would effect their tenure of office; and while the farmers
favored good roads, they thought the earth roads could be im-
proved sufficiently for their needs; hard roads should be built
only on the most used highways; and before any program of
road construction was entered upon, a more equitable distribu-
tion of their cost between the state and county and the property
owners should be arranged. They were alarmed at the enor-
mous cost involved. The Illinois State Grange, a representative
farmers' organization, while approving good roads, opposed
the issue of bonds to pay for their improvement. 30
The continued agitation of the subject was, however, having
an effect, and by 1903 public sentiment had reached such a state
that the legislature passed an act providing for a good roads
commission, consisting of three members who were to investi-
gate and report on all phases of road improvement. 31 New in-
terest was created in the subject. A road materials testing
laboratory was established at the University of Illinois ; several
local "good roads" associations were formed; a few localities
where, stone was convenient built macadam roads. 32 The
movement was also indorsed by the Illinois State Grange and
the Illinois Farmers' Institute, though in each case with reser-
vations.
When the general assembly convened in 1905 the time
seemed ripe for some progressive road legislation. The report
of the good roads commission pointed out that under the " hard
roads " law of 1883 only twenty-six and one-half miles of mac-
adam roads had been built in thirteen counties in twenty-two
30 Journal of Proceedings of Illinois State Grange, 1900, p. 25.
31 Laius of 1903, p. 302.
32 Engineering News, 63:131.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 149
years. They accordingly urged the appointment of a perma-
nent state highway commission and a state highway engineer
to carry on the work under a more centralized administration.
Stimulated by this report and by the recommendations of both
the outgoing and incoming governors, the legislature passed a
law providing for a state highway engineer and a permanent
though unsalaried state highway commission which was to carry
on investigations and experimental work on roads and to
give advice in regard to highways and bridges to local road
officials. 33
As members of the new state highway commission Governor
Deneen appointed Edmund J. James, Joseph R. Fulkerson, and
LaFayette Funk, and they organized for business February,
1906. One of their first official acts was the publication of an
" Open Letter to the People of Illinois," explaining their powers
and purposes, with a view to allaying the hostility of the local
units, whose particularism made any movement toward centrali-
zation all but impossible. Concluding, from their preliminary
investigation, that much of the money which was being spent
on road improvement was wasted, the commission first launched
a campaign for better earth roads and for the use of the road
drag. This resulted in a wave of enthusiasm for road dragging,
which abated about 1908 as the results were not so great as had
been anticipated; 34 but the use of the drag was revived again a
couple of years later as its functions were better understood;
and it has since been effectively employed down to the present
time in earth road maintenance.
The state highway commission appointed in 1906 continued
its work until 1913. During that period of seven years it con-
ducted a campaign of education as to the advantages of better
roads but left to the local units the actual work of road construc-
tion and maintenance. In the furtherance of its educational
propaganda it carried on the following lines of activity: an in-
vestigation of the road building materials of the state; the
33 House Journal, 1905, 209; Laws of 1905, p. 74-75.
34 Report of the Illinois Highway Commission, 1906, p. in; 1908-1909, p.
29-31. Mr. A. N. Johnson was appointed state highway engineer.
150 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
taking of a traffic census on various roads to determine the
amount of through traffic; furnishing speakers to public meet-
ings to explain the work and purpose of the commission; the
building, under the direction of the state highway engineer, of
experimental roads of various kinds, such as macadam, oil-
treated earth, concrete, and brick; the distribution of free
crushed stone prepared at the state penitentiaries; and giving
advice and furnishing plans and specifications for bridges, espe-
cially of reenforced concrete or of steel, the number of which
grew markedly under their influence.
Public opinion in favor of better roads as evidenced in the
utterances of representative organizations showed a steady
growth. The farmers, who were the most conservative ele-
ment, fell in line gradually. In 1907 there was organized the
" Farmers' Good Roads League of Illinois," which favored the
construction of permanent hard roads on the main routes of
traffic by federal and state aid. 35 County control of road work
was being urged by the state highway commission, and in 1910
the Illinois Farmers' Institute indorsed the establishment of
larger units for road administration, bond issues for road im-
provement, and larger appropriations for the commission. The
State Grange, the most conservative of all the organizations,
advocated a complete system of improved roads for the state,
to be built by federal, state, and county aid, and the levying of
an automobile tax to provide a fund for road improvement. 36
By 1912 it was clear that the bankers, business men, and pro-
gressive farmers throughout the state were in favor of state
aid for'road improvement and of a revision of the road laws
of the state as the first step in the movement for better roads.
In this movement the more general and growing use of the auto-
mobile was an important factor.
Road legislation was keeping pace with the growth of public
opinion. In 1907 bond issues for hard roads were authorized
by law, more restrictions were placed upon the powers of local
85 Report of the Illinois Highway Commission, 1907, p. 15.
36 Journal of Proceedings of the Illinois State Grange, 1911, p. 45.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 151
highway commissioners in the repair and maintenance of roads,
and a road drag law was passed permitting systematic dragging
of earth roads. In 1911 a wide tire law was passed and a law
appropriating all automobile license fees as a " road fund" for
the construction of improved highways. In the same year the
appropriations for the state highway commission were increased
from twenty-five to one hundred thousand dollars per annum.
A bill to create the office of county superintendent of highways
failed to become law. 37
Before taking further steps the legislature thought it wise
to investigate the road situation even more thoroughly than had
been done, and in 1910 a legislative committee of seven was ap-
pointed for this purpose. Their report showed the bad condi-
tions existing in the state 38 and was followed by the appoint-
ment of another committee in 1911 with instructions to revise
the road laws of the state and present their recommendations
in the form of a bill. This committee reported that only about
ten per cent of the ninety-five thousand miles of road in the state
were improved in a permanent manner, while in the neighbor-
ing state of Indiana the proportion was thirty-eight per cent and
in Massachusetts it was fifty per cent. 39 The roads of Illinois
were moreover poorly constructed and maintained, and there
was no uniformity in the road work as between adjacent town-
ships and counties, that is there were no through roads. The
committee made a most exhaustive report and embodied their
conclusions in the form of a bill which was passed in 1913 under
the name of the Tice road law. 40
The Tice road law provided for a state highway depart-
ment of three salaried commissioners, and a state highway
engineer with assistant, subordinate officials, clerks, and other
37 Laws of 1911, p. 106, 498-500; Senate Journal, 1912, special session, 4.
38 House Journal, 1911, 690-693.
39 This was an improvement since 1906, when ninety-five per cent of the
roads were earth roads. See Report of the Illinois Highway Commission, 1906,
p. v; House Journal, 1913, 207.
40 Printed as part of House Journal, 1913, 1494-1575, and also issued as a
separate publication. The accompanying bill is found, in ibid., 1576-1617; Laiu$
of 1913, p. 520-581.
152 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
assistants; it also provided for county superintendents of high-
ways, state aid for the improvement of the more important
roads in the counties, the use of convict labor, the reduction in
the width of all public roads from sixty-six to forty feet, and the
election of three highway commissioners in each township or
road district. A provision was also inserted to permit the op-
tional election of a single highway commissioner for local road
administration, but political forces were too strong for this to
be made mandatory for all counties.
Generous support was given by the general assembly to the
new movement for improved roads. For the expenses of the
new state highway commission $100,000 per annum was appro-
priated, while for the construction of state aid roads $400,000
was allotted for the fiscal year 1914 and $700,000 for 1915.
The automobile license fees were to be used as a nucleus for this
state aid fund. The next general assembly raised the annual
appropriations for expenses to $200,000, and for road con-
struction to $1,000,000 for the years beginning July i, 1915
and 1916. The appropriations for the next biennium were
$346,060 and $1,200,000 respectively. 41
Some delay occurred in carrying out the provisions of the
new law, owing to a suit brought to test its constitutionality, but
it was upheld by the state supreme court. Actual work on the
proposed system of state aid roads was inaugurated on April
15, 1914, when Governor Dunne turned the first shovelful of
earth on the improvement of the Aurora-Elgin highway, re-
ported to have been the first state aid road in the state. During
the year the state highway commission awarded contracts for
seventy- four sections of state aid road, aggregating 91.27 miles,
of which 73.56 were of concrete and 17.71 of brick. 42 The
average price of the concrete was $10,320 per mile, and of the
brick $11, 880 for a ten-foot pavement. Four-foot macadam
shoulders on each side raised the cost $1,760 a- mile. The
highway commission estimated the cost of building the pro-
41 Laws of 1913, p. 42 ; Laws of 1915, p. 76.
42 Engineering News, 71:993; 72:1190.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 153
posed 15,000 miles of improved roads at $140,000,000 or
slightly over $9,000 a mile. It was evident therefore that with
the limited appropriations for state aid, generous as they were,
only very slow progress could be made in carrying out the pro-
posed program for improved roads. Under the plan as pro-
vided for, the state bears one-half the expense of construction
of road surfaces, all the cost of maintenance of concrete or brick
roads, half the cost of maintenance of macadam roads, and none
of that of earth roads. 43 Two counties, Cook and Vermilion,
realizing the slow progress of road improvement under the
state aid plan, voted, at the general election in November, 1914,
for bond issues of their own for this purpose. Vermilion
county voted a bond issue of $1,500,000 for a system of im-
proved highways all over the county, the construction of which
has since been in progress. 44 It now has completed or under
construction about 170 miles of brick and concrete roads. Cook
county voted a bond issue of $2,000,000 and up to January i,
1917, had completed about 70 miles of improved roads, by the
sale of bonds and state aid, and planned to build over 80 miles
additional during the year I9I7. 43
By the enactment of the civil administrative code by the
general assembly in 1917, which went into effect July i of that
year, the department of public works and buildings was created.
This now exercises the powers and duties of the state highway
commission, the canal commissioners, the rivers and lakes com-
mission, the waterway commission, and other similar bodies.
Under the director of public works and buildings there are a
superintendent of highways, a chief highway engineer, an assist-
ant highway engineer, the necessary subordinate and clerical
forces, and an unpaid board of highway advisors. The centrali-
zation of powers and functions thus secured will undoubtedly
43 La<ws of 1915, p. 602. To build the proposed fifteen thousand miles of
state aid road would cost one hundred and fifty million dollars at an average of
ten thousand dollars a mile. If the state bore half of this it would take seventy-
five years to carry through the program with annual appropriations of one mil-
lion dollars a year.
44 Engineering News, 74 : 1079.
45 Chicago Tribune, January 28, 1917.
154 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
promote the work of road improvement and secure greater effi-
ciency and economy in the public works of the state.
In 1917 steps were also taken to obtain larger means to
carry forward the work of "pulling Illinois out of the mud."
An act of congress passed in July, 1916, had apportioned the
sum of $85,000,000 among the states to be spent for public
roads during the five years beginning with 1917; and of this
sum Illinois would receive about $3,000,000. During this
year the general assembly of Illinois voted to submit to popular
vote the question of issuing $60,000,000 of state bonds for road
improvement, the proposition to be voted upon at the Novem-
ber election of I9i8. 46 The participation by the United States
in the European war, however, will prevent the immediate
carrying out of this program, even in the event of a favorable
vote.
The development of public sentiment in favor of improved
roads in the state of Illinois, as elsewhere, has been slow but
steady. It was hampered by ignorance of the principles of road
construction, especially on the types of soil to be found in the
state, by the distance of many localities from supplies of stone
or other material for hard road building, by lack of familiarity
with the physical conditions of road maintenance and of the
effect of climatic changes, and by lack of appreciation of the
economic value of improved highways to a community. As in
other great economic movements, prejudice and conflicting in-
terests for a time retarded development, but at the end of
twenty-five years distinct progress may be noted, not merely in
the growth of a favorable public opinion, but in better road
legislation and in actual road construction. To this end the
advent of the automobile and its increasing use among the farm-
ers of the state both for pleasure and business purposes has con-
tributed largely. The importance of the work of the state
highway commission as an educational and experimental agency
can scarcely be overestimated. But the time for such a move-
ment in Illinois was ripe. The growing population with its
46 Laws of 1917, p. 714-716.
WATER TRANSPORTATION 155
expanding needs demanded better means of communication,
which even the rapid development of the steam and electric
railroads were not able to supply. A rapid continuation of this
movement may be expected until Illinois is crossed in every
direction with a network of improved highways adequate to her
needs and importance.
VIII. LABOR ORGANIZATION AND LEGISLATION
THE labor situation in Chicago in 1894 was a serious one.
The World's Fair boom had attracted to the city a large
number of workers, who swelled the ranks of the unemployed
after the momentary demand for labor ceased. Their situa-
tion was aggravated by the depression which followed the
panic of 1893, and which filled Chicago with homeless and
workless men. This city has always been noted for the large
number of partially employed or wholly unemployed workers
within its limits. In 1892 the number in the latter group was
put at 1 30,000, 1 undoubtedly an exaggerated estimate in view
of the opportunities for work; but in the winter of 18931894
it was declared by Mayor Harrison that there were 200,000
out of work. 2 This was due not merely to the presence in the
city of an unusual number of persons seeking employment, but
also to the partial or temporary cessation of accustomed lines
of work as a result of the panic. 3
The labor situation was profoundly affected by these
changes in the labor market and in conditions of employ-
ment. During the early part of 1893 there were numerous
strikes for increases of wages, which were generally success-
ful and short lived. 4 After the effects of the panic began to
be felt and the artificial stimulation given to business by the
exposition wore off, however, strikes were more generally
against reductions of wages or for restoration of the former
1 American Artisan, May 7, 1892, p. 13.
2 Closson, " The Unemployed in American Cities," Quarterly Journal of
Economics, 8 : 189.
3 " At the close of 1892, up to the close of 1896, nearly all of the great
manufacturing industries of Chicago were practically at a standstill." Testi-
mony of M. B. Madden before the industrial commission, March 22, 1900,
Report of the Industrial Commission, 8:108.
4 For a tabular statement of all strikes for 1893 and 1894, see " Strikes and
Lockouts," Report of the Commissioner of Labor, 1896, 1:236-258.
156
LABOR ORGANIZATION 157
wage scale. Less frequently, too, were they successful. As
usual the first outbreaks arose in the unstable building trades,
which moreover suffered most severely as a result of the
overproduction of the previous year. The building contractors
had signed a wage scale on April I, 1893, agreeing to pay
forty cents an hour as a minimum, but two months later they
complained that those contractors who had not bound them-
selves were getting men for thirty cents an hour under the
altered conditions of the labor market. The agreement was
submitted to an arbitration board which reduced wages to
thirty-five cents an hour for the months of July, August, and
September, the busiest months in this trade. 5 Strikes against
reductions of wages were frequent in the building trades all
summer in August among the tile layers, the painters, and
the riveters, in September among the painters, and in December
among the steamfitters.
Resistance to wage reductions was even more widespread
in the spring of 1894. The following are some of the strikes
called for this single purpose in Chicago: carpenters, com-
positors, and upholsterers in February; plasterers, iron and
brass workers, and canal laborers in March; painters and
roofers in April; carpenters and cigar makers in May; coop-
ers and engineers in June. 6 And what was true in Chicago was
true on a smaller scale in the rest of the state. It was evident
that in the industrial readjustment going on the workingmen
suffered heavily as shown by the frequent strikes. In most
cases, however, the men made no open resistance to wage
reductions, but clung grimly to their jobs in spite of decreas-
ing pay.
All these incidents, however, were reduced to insignificance
by the historic Pullman strike, which occurred in the spring and
summer of 1894. This momentous struggle began with an
attempt of the workers at the plant of the Pullman Palace
Car Company to restore wages which had been cut several
5 Arbeiter-Zeitung, July 5, 1893.
6 " Strikes and Lockouts," Report of the Commissioner of Labor, 1894,
1:236-258.
i 5 8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
times during the past year, the average reduction for all em-
ployees averaging twenty-five per cent. 7 The men presented
their demands to the Pullman Company, which answered by
discharging the committee which presented the claims. The
men thereupon struck on May 1 1. At first the strike was local
in its nature, but it was soon made national in its far-reaching
scope.
A year previously, in June, 1893, the American Railway
Union had been organized in Chicago under the leadership of
Eugene V. Debs. At this time it claimed to have a membership
of 150,000. Unlike the railway brotherhoods, this organi-
zation included all railway employees, even those engaged in
the allied trades of car building and equipment It had there-
fore admitted to its membership some of the employees of the
Pullman Company, enrolling about 4,000 in the months of
March, April, and May, 1894. In the inclusion of these
diverse elements and in the general character of its aims it
resembled the Knights of Labor, and indeed at its convention
in 1894 the American Railway Union adopted a resolution
tendering "to the Knights of Labor its hearty alliance in all
movements brought about for the elevation and benefit of the
laborer." 8
On June 22 the American Railway Union held its annual
convention in Chicago and the strike among the Pullman
workers came up for consideration. Although the officers of
the union had advised against a strike at Pullman, they felt
that the strikers must be supported, and decided that in case
the company was not willing to arbitrate by June 26, the mem-
bers of the union would- refuse to handle Pullman cars and
equipment after that date. As the company refused to submit
the question of wages to arbitration or to recognize the Amer-
ican Railway Union, the strike order went into effect. 9
7 The Strike at Pullman, 17-18. See also Gompers, "The Railway Strike,"
American Federationist, 1:121, and an unsigned account in the Railway Times,
July 14, 1894.
8 Ibid., June 15, 1894.
The Strike at Pullman, 12.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 159
Just as the Railway Union sponsored the cause of the
Pullman strikers, so the General Managers' Association, repre-
senting twenty-four roads centering or terminating in Chicago,
came to the aid of the Pullman Company. This organization
had been formed in 1886 to determine a common policy as to
freight rates, but it dealt incidentally with wages. The sym-
pathetic strike directed against the Pullman Company now
became a general struggle between the railroads and their
employees. The distinction between Pullman and other cars
could not be maintained and soon all train service was affected
including the railway mail service. Rioting took place, trains
were obstructed, railway property was destroyed, and even
loss of life occurred. By July 6 the strike had been so far
successful in its object that only six of the twenty-three roads
entering Chicago were unobstructed in freight, passenger, and
mail service. 10
At this point the federal government took a hand in the
struggle. A sweeping injunction was issued on July 2 against
Debs and other officials in the American Railway Union en-
joining them from interfering with the carrying of the mail
or obstructing interstate commerce. 11 As these orders were
not obeyed, President Cleveland on July 4 ordered United
States troops into Chicago. This act was protested by Gov-
ernor John P. Altgeld on the ground that it was an inter-
ference with state rights, and that the state troops were able
to restore and maintain order. But the facts were against him
and the federal executive proclaimed a state of insurrection,
first in Illinois and later in railroad districts further west, and
announced his firm determination to prevent any interference
with the mails or with interstate commerce, to enforce the man-
dates and decrees of the federal courts, and to protect federal
property from destruction. The state militia was also called
out to maintain order in the city. The total force employed
during the continuance of the strike was I4,i86. 12
10 Cleveland, The Government in the Chicago Strike of 1894, P- 3 2 -
lbid., 21.
12 Wright, The Battles of Labor, 140.
160 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
On July 10 Debs and three other officials in the American
Railway Union were arrested for conspiracy, and on July 17
they were rearrested for contempt of court in violating the
injunction issued against them. While the first effect of this
action was to incite the strikers to more determined resistance,
in the end it demoralized them and broke the strike. An
attempt was made to call a general sympathetic strike of all
trades in the city, but the movement went awry. On July 12
the executive board of the American Federation of Labor,
together with the officials of a number of national trade-unions,
met in Chicago to consider the situation. Although they ex-
pressed sympathy with the purpose of the strike they coun-
seled the men to return to work. On August 5 the local unions
called off the strike on all the railroads except two, and the
strike was officially ended. 13 Debs was later sentenced to six
months in prison and his three colleagues to three months each.
The effects of the strike did not stop here. The losses
were enormous, aggregating, according to an estimate by Brad-
street's, for the country as a whole about $80,000,000. The
American Railway Union lost its suddenly won power, while
the railway brotherhoods, which have always been conserva-
tively managed, gained greatly in influence and prestige. But
most important of all was the definite establishment of the
power of the federal government to prevent any obstruction
of interstate commerce, even to the extent of employing United
States troops for that purpose. Under the circumstances the
defeat of the men was inevitable, especially in view of the
condition of the labor market at the time.
Although the workingmen lost the Pullman strike, the
bitterness generated by this conflict together with the hard
times led them to attempt to redress their grievances by polit-
ical action. In November, 1893, the Illinois State Federation
of Labor had avowed its faith in this method. " The repeated
deception," it declared in the preamble to its platform, "of
13 " Report on the Chicago Strike of June- July, 1894, by the United States
Strike Commission," Executive Documents, 53 congress, 3 session, number 7.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 161
the laboring people by the Republican and Democratic parties
emphasizes the necessity for independent political action on
the part of the producers, and we declare that the reforms
necessary to a successful solution of the labor problem can
only be attained by entering the political arena with the firm
determination to obtain administrative supremacy through the
ballot box." 14
At this same meeting the federation instructed its execu-
tive board to call within the next six months a conference of
representatives of the Illinois State Federation of Labor, the
Farmers' Alliance, the Knights of Labor, " and such other
industrial bodies as may be deemed essential to the advance-
ment of that unity of action and singleness of purpose which,
when attained, is a great stride toward the success of our
common aims." 13 Early in May appeared the call for the
proposed convention, to be held in Springfield from July 2 to 4.
All " bona fide industrial and political reform organizations"
were asked to send delegates.
The object of this convention was to consider the desir-
ability of independent political action on the part of labor,
and to discuss as its platform a list of reforms which had been
submitted to the American Federation of Labor at its Chicago
convention in 1893 by Thomas J. Morgan, a socialist from
that city, representing the International Machinists Union,
and which had been the subject of debate by trade-unionists
all over the country. This declaration called for compulsory
education, direct legislation, a legal eight-hour day, sanitary
inspection of workshops, mines and houses, an employers'
liability law, abolition of the contract system on public works,
abolition of the sweating system, municipal ownership of pub-
lic utilities, nationalization of railroads, telegraphs, telephones,
and mines, the collective ownership of all the means of produc-
tion and distribution, and the referendum in legislation. 16 The
14 Proceedings of the Annual Session of the State Federation of Labor,
1893, p. 21.
15 Ibid., 42.
16 Eight Hour Herald, May 10, 1894.
162 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
section indorsing the collective ownership of all the means of
production and distribution was known as plank 10 and figured
conspicuously in subsequent discussions.
This political program was indorsed by a large number
of trade-unions, and by the state federations of labor in Illinois
and ten other states, including Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin,
Missouri, Kansas, and Nebraska. It also had the indorse-
ment of city centrals in Cleveland, Toledo, Lansing, Grand
Rapids, Saginaw, Milwaukee, and other cities. Fearful of its
influence, the more conservative labor leaders, like Gompers,
finally demanded that plank 10 with its pledge in favor of
"the collective ownership by the people of all means of pro-
duction and distribution," be stricken out. 17
The peoples party had meantime arranged for a state con-
vention to be held in Springfield on May 28, and it now invited
the workingmen to come to its meeting. This party, repre-
senting primarily the discontented elements among the rural
population, had first entered Illinois politics in the fall of 1892,
but had secured only 20,000 votes out of over 800,000 cast
in the state. General J. B. Weaver, the presidential candi-
date, obtained but 1,214 votes. The workingmen were not yet
willing to desert the old parties and to organize separately for
political action. Now, however, in the spring of 1894, the
situation had changed. The workers were feeling the full
effects of the depression in industry which followed the panic
of 1893, and were ready to grasp at new remedies which
offered a solution of their difficulties.
When the convention of the peoples party opened it was
a motley gathering of heterogeneous elements representing all
shades of reform opinion. Representatives were present from
the Farmers Mutual Benefit Association, Farmers Alliance and
Industrial Union, Knights of Agriculture, Industrial Legion,
Knights of Labor, Illinois State Federation of Labor, socialist
labor party, the Open Alliance, and the single taxers. Chicago
sent a labor delegation headed by Thomas J. Morgan. The
17 Commons, History of Labour in the United States, 2: 511.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 163
platform drawn up by him was submitted and approved, with
the exception of plank 10. A struggle over the adoption of
this extreme socialist proposal ensued and resulted in the rout
of the Chicagoans. 18
When the date for the convention of the Illinois State
Federation of Labor arrived the country was in the throes of
the great railroad strike. Owing to the paralysis of the rail-
road system the delegates did not assemble until July 3. The
composition of the gathering was not dissimilar from that
which had met five weeks earlier under the auspices of the
peoples party. It comprised trade-unionists, Knights of Labor,
populists, single taxers, socialists, and even anarchists who
avowed a faith in political action. Henry D. Lloyd, who at
this time occupied a position midway between radical reform
and socialism, appeared as a delegate from the Chicago Ger-
man Typographical Union No. 9. When the gathering was
called to order every one was in an excited and vindictive
mood. On the second of July an injunction had been issued
against the Pullman strikers which threatened to tie their
hands, and on the fourth United States troops appeared in
Chicago.
The platform was the center of discussion. The committee
which had it in charge could not agree and submitted a major-
ity and a minority report. The first was a reform platform,
the second was radical and included plank 10. The single
taxers and the conservative trade-unionists under the leader-
ship of William C. Pomeroy, formerly a waiter but now a
real estate dealer, lined up against plank 10, while the radical
trade-unionists and socialists under the leadership of Morgan
favored it. After two days of debate plank 10 was defeated
by a vote of 59 to 49. The platform as adopted was practi-
cally the same as the one indorsed by the peoples party on
May 28, containing the demands of both the farmers and
the industrialists. The convention closed by indorsing the
candidates for state offices nominated by the peoples party,
18 Chicago Tribune, May 29, 1894.
1 64 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
and thus threw its political fortunes in with that organiza-
tion. 19
When the delegates returned home another struggle for
domination took place within the party in Cook County. This
time the trade-unionists were on one side and the radicals and
socialists on the other. On August 18 some 875 delegates
met in Chicago to nominate a county ticket. The trade-unions
had the largest representation, namely 349 ; then came the
American Railway Union with 1 89, the peoples party with 130,
the socialist labor party with 130, the Knights of Labor with
58, the single taxers with 10, and the Turner societies with 9.
The opposition between the two factions showed itself at the
very beginning and an effort to elect a permanent chairman
threw the meeting into disorder and broke up the assemblage.
The trade-union faction threw its support in the ensuing elec-
tions to the democrats for state and railroad officials and to
the populists for county officials. 20 The radical faction on
the other hand remained true to its original purpose and car-
ried through an independent campaign, indorsing the peoples
party platform and candidates. The results of the election
were a great disappointment, however, the average populist
vote in Cook county being only about 31,000. None of the
candidates were elected.
The new party had been made up of a number of incon-
gruous and inharmonious elements socialists, single taxers,
farmers, and trade-unionists and disaffection soon set in.
Efforts to placate the different interests were unsuccessful,
and gradually one group after another deserted the coalition
and returned to its original allegiance. In the spring elections
of 1895 the vote was only about half what it had been the
previous fall. This was practically the end of the peoples
party in Chicago. The socialists deserted it in the spring
elections of 1896, and when W. J. Bryan was nominated for
president of the United States by the democratic as well as
19 Eight Hour Herald, July 10, 1894.
20 Arbeiter-Zeitung, November i, 1894.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 165
by the populist convention the reformers joined the ranks of
the democratic party from which most of them had originally
come. The elements which had attempted to secure independ-
ent political action by the formation of a new party simply
returned to their former allegiance.
The same dissatisfaction which had led some of the more
radical labor elements to form an independent political party,
also led to revolt among the existing labor organizations. The
first to feel this was the Chicago Trades Assembly. Evils
had sprung up in the twenty years of its existence since 1877.
It was dominated by a clique of old "wheel horses" most of
whom were no longer active in their trades; it had become a
common practice for the presidents of the organization to be
rewarded for political services by jobs at the city hall. And
it was felt that if the assembly could not be purged of polit-
ical and extraneous influences a new organization must take
its place.
As the former seemed hopeless a secession of the dis-
satisfied unions took place, led by local union number 14 of
the Cigar Makers International Union. In January, 1895,
some sixty-five delegates met in its hall and organized a new
central body. There were in this meeting representatives of
the bakers, bookbinders, box makers and sawyers, carpenters,
clothing cutters, garment makers, machinists, musicians, plas-
terers, press feeders and job printers, woodworkers, and the
Bohemian Central Labor Union. A resolution was passed
that no one should be admitted as a delegate who was not
actually employed in his trade, and a committee was appointed
to draft a constitution. The name subsequently adopted was
the Chicago Trade and Labor Congress.
Although the congress disavowed politics the platform
adopted showed strong populist influence and contained fea-
tures which were purely political. It declared that the pur-
pose of the organization was to hold meetings in the interest
of labor, to settle difficulties between its members' trades and
their employers, to secure effective sanitary inspection of fac-
i66 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tories, mines, and workingmen's homes, to protest against
prison and child labor, to secure an eight-hour day and like
pay for like work irrespective of sex, to abolish the truck
system and secure payment of wages in lawful money; but it
also declared for the direct election of the president and vice
president of the United States, for the abolition of the senate,
nationalization of the means of transportation and communi-
cation, reform of the judiciary, prohibition of stockjobbing,
municipalization of public utilities, abolition of the contract
system on public work, abolition of the fee system, an eight-
hour day on public works, and the initiative and referendum.
As an ultimate aim the congress set for itself the displace-
ment of the capitalist system by the cooperative commonwealth.
Here is found a large share of the peoples party platform
including the socialistic plank 10.
It was evident that a body organized for these purposes
was a political party rather than a trade-union organization.
Accordingly the American Federation of Labor refused to
recognize it. At its convention in New York, in December,
1 895, the federation urged a union between the two rival bodies,
and suggested a reorganization of the Trades Assembly so as
to eliminate the objectionable features. It recommended that
the old name and charter be retained, but that a new consti-
tution be adopted and new officers elected. 21
Both the Trades Assembly and the Labor Congress agreed
to this plan but owing to hostility on both sides, were unable
to reach an amicable settlement. The American Federation
of Labor then issued a circular to the separate unions urging
that they organize a new body on the lines suggested. Accord-
ingly, delegates from some thirty-four unions met and took
the initial steps toward the formation of a new central body.
The result was the present Chicago Federation of Labor. The
Trades Assembly declared itself dissolved prior to this meet-
ing; the Labor Congress voted to dissolve soon after. On
December 6 a new constitution was adopted.
21 Eight Hour Herald, January 4, 1896.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 167
The new organization was in every way a concession to
the reform ideas of the secessionists who organized the trade
and labor congress. By its constitution it barred employers,
politicians, and ex-trade-unionists from membership. It de-
clared for the election of the president and vice president of
the United States by the direct vote of the people, the national-
ization of all means of communication, the reform of the judi-
ciary, prohibition of speculation in the necessaries of life,
municipalization of public utilities, the execution of all city
work by the city itself without the intervention of contractors,
elimination of the fee system in public offices, abolition of tene-
ment housework and the sweating system, and the introduction
of the referendum. 22 This was closely modeled upon the plat-
form of the Labor Congress two years before, and has been
but little changed since.
By the organization of the Chicago Federation of Labor
the Central Labor Union was left without a real reason for
existence. It was refused recognition by the federation, and
gradually the member unions deserted it in favor of the newer
and more promising organization. After this its demise was
only a question of time. An apparently abortive attempt to
organize all classes of unskilled labor into a national body
was made in 1902, when W. F. Smith founded the "Amal-
gamated Common Laborers of America," at Jonesboro, Illi-
nois. 23 No further account of this organization could be
found.
In 1898 the long period of depression came to an end,
during which the problem of the workers was to hold the gains
they had made, that of the trade-unions was to maintain their
organization. With the return of industrial prosperity, how-
ever, a rapid expansion of labor organizations occurred.
"At no time in its history, not excepting the throbbing year
of 1886, did labour organization make such important gains
22 Constitution and by-laws adopted December 6, 1896, and revised March
16, 1902, October 2, 1904, and June 17, 1906.
23 Journal of the Knights of Labor, May, 1902.
168 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
as during the next five years." 24 Especially significant was
the extension of the trade-union movement into hitherto
untouched trades and among the unskilled, and into the indus-
trially newer regions of the south and west. In this move-
ment Chicago and the state of Illinois had a leading part and
shared in the labor development and the struggles incident
thereto.
The monthly reports from the various trade-unions
throughout Illinois printed in the American Federationist
during this period convey the impression that work was plenti-
ful, strikes were not frequent and in general were quickly won
by the workers, and that labor organization was spreading. 25
Some of the writers are quite evidently interested in reporting
only the good things, but the general absence of complaints
is strong evidence of prosperity. Increase in wages and reduc-
tion in hours were most frequently reported. The situation
was summed up by a writer from Auburn as follows: "It is
hardly worth while to put much time to organize new unions
just now .... because every one is very busy and time can-
not be spared for this work." 26 These good times continued
with minor interruptions through the year 1907, when the
after effects of the panic of that year began to be felt. The
state board of arbitration in 1906 commented upon the com-
parative industrial peace in Illinois and explained it as due
in the first place to industrial activity and good demand for
labor "wages .... higher than at any time in our his-
tory" and secondly to the memory of the teamsters' sym-
pathetic strike during the previous year. 27
The prosperity of these years had, however, been inter-
rupted by several serious disputes. One of the most long
drawn out and important of these was the building trades
dispute in Chicago in 1900 and I9OI. 28 This was fought
24 Selig Perlman in History of Labour in the United States, 2: 521.
25 American Federationist, 6:226; 7:74; 8:383; 9:382; 11:515.
26 Ibid., 8:383-384.
27 Report of the State Board of Arbitration, 1908, p. 2.
28 For a full account of this struggle see Bogart, " The Chicago Building
LABOR ORGANIZATION 169
out between the Building Trades Council on the one side,
representing the men, and the Building Contractors Council
on the other. It was alleged by the men that the contractors
wished to crush the Trades Council because they would not
consent to make "exclusive agreements" to work only for
members of the contractors council. The contractors insisted
that they could no longer submit to the irresponsible tyranny
and dictation of the Building Trades Council, though they
expressed their willingness to treat with the constituent unions.
The immediate cause of the strike was the demand on the
part of the contractors that the carpenters work on Saturday
afternoons beginning February 10. As the Saturday half
holiday had been enjoyed by the carpenters since the momen-
tous strike for an eight-hour day in 1890 they refused to
accede to this demand, and suspended work. Sympathetic
strikes and lockouts in allied building trades completely para-
lyzed building operations in the city and rendered about
50,000 men idle.
The progress of the struggle was marked by consider-
able bitterness and not a little violence. Various efforts to
arbitrate the dispute were made, but they were all fruitless.
By the summer many of the constituent unions began to desert
the Trades Council and to return to work. Building operations
were about normal by July, 1900. But the dispute dragged
for over a year and was not formally terminated until April,
1901, when the Building Trades Council voted to disband. A
few days later a new organization was formed by fifteen of
the eighteen strong trades in the building industry under the
name of the Chicago Building Trades League. This new
body was formed by men in the old unions who wished to
live up to agreements made with the contractors and was thus
a victory for the better element in the trade-unions rather
than for the contractors.
The same question of the trade agreement came up in the
Trades Dispute," Political Science Quarterly, 16:114-141, 222-247. See also
Report of the Industrial Commission, 8:ix-xxxii.
1 70 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
machinists' strike of I9OO. 29 This strike was inaugurated in
Chicago in March to secure exclusive employment of union
men, a nine-hour day, increase in wages, and the limitation of
apprentices. When these demands were refused by the em-
ployers about 6,000 men left their positions. The strike soon
spread to other cities, involving about 9,000 men. At this
point the dispute was taken up by the National Metal Trades
Association, representing the employers, and the International
Machinists Union, representing the men, and a trade
agreement was drawn up between these two national organ-
izations. This marked a long step forward in collective bar-
gaining, and the substitution of the principle of arbitration
for violence, but it was unfortunately broken the following
year by the machinists' organization. 30
The spread of trade agreements may be regarded as a
sign of the growth in power, recognition, and responsibility
on the part of organized labor. One of the earliest stable
trade agreements in a local field was that of the Chicago brick-
layers in 1887, but the first one on a national scale was that
between the molders and National Association of Stove Man-
ufacturers in 1 89 1. 31 A great impetus was given to this
movement in 1898 when a general agreement was made
between the coal operators and the miners' union in the bitu-
minous coal district of Illinois and the neighboring states.
The agreement of the machinists in 1900 was another stride
in the same direction, but their action the following year under
the leadership of irresponsible leaders threatened to destroy
the willingness of employers to enter into engagements with
labor organizations. In 1902, however, a strong stand for
the maintenance of contracts was made by John Mitchell, the
president of the United Mine Workers of America, who
refused to order a sympathetic strike of the bituminous coal
miners at the time of the anthracite strike, because they had
29 Bogart, "The Machinists' Strike, 1900," Yale Review, 9:302-313. See
also Report of the Industrial Commission, 8:v-viii.
30 Bogart, "The Machinists' Strike, 1901," Yale Review, 10:249-267.
81 Commons, History of Labour in the United States, 2 : 480.
a time agreement with the operators which he refused to
break. 32 Both the miners and the operators were organized
and had made joint agreements providing for arbitration of
disputes. This had brought an era of peace into the bitu-
minous coal district such as it had never before experienced.
" The coal operators and miners of the State furnish an example
of the peace that usually follows the perfection of organization.
For many years miners' strikes were the most serious labor
disturbances from which the State suffered." 33 At present
the trade agreement is one of the most generally accepted
principles in the labor movement in the United States. With
the development of strong, responsible, and ably led labor
organizations, which can bargain on fairly equal terms with
their employers, this method may be expected to take the place
of strikes and lockouts and violent disputes.
The more serious strikes during the following years were
those of the freight handlers in Chicago in 1902 involving
some 8,000 or 9,000 men; of some 5,000 cooks, waiters, and
other help in Chicago hotels and restaurants in 1903; of the
United Garment Workers of America in 1905, which was
followed by a sympathetic strike of the teamsters, the latter
resulting in a great deal of violence, destruction of property,
and even loss of life. In 1906 occurred a great miners' strike,
involving some 60,000 men, over restoration of the wage scale
which had been cut in 1904; the men finally won their
demand. 34 The telegraphers' strike in 1907 in Chicago,
Springfield, Rockford, and other Illinois cities was a failure.
The year 1908 was one of industrial depression, following
the panic of 1907, but the next two or three years were char-
acterized by unusual activity among organized workers of
Illinois. The most serious disputes which arose were the sea-
men's strike in 1909 and the miners' strike in 1910. The
vessel owners, organized as the Lake Carriers Association,
525.
83 Report of the State Board of Arbitration, 1903, p. i.
34 Ibid., 1902, p. 65; 1903, p. 22] 1906, p. 2, 30, 57-63.
172 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
had for several years been trying to break up the unions of
the workers, although they had had agreements with several
of the crafts, but now they declared for the open shop and
were able finally to disrupt the unions. 35 The strike of the
miners was a periodic outbreak, this time a little larger
72,000 men were involved and more extended than usual,
against the conditions in the bituminous coal district. Many
more men were kept at the mines than could find employment
there and as a result the average mine ran only about 200
days in the year. The annual wage therefore was down to
a starvation basis. The main issue was a demand for an
increase of wages, but there was also a dispute as to who
should pay the shot firers provided for by the law of 1905.
On most points in dispute the miners were victorious. 36
Another movement which in recent years has been attract-
ing much attention, not only in labor circles but among all
observers of labor development, is the growth of socialism.
This has made rapid progress since about 1900, and in this
movement Illinois has borne a rather conspicuous part. Any
attempt in this state to trace the growth of socialism among
the workers leads one into a confused tangle of new organi-
zations, splits, attempted reconciliations, cross-purposes, and
personal jealousies. Out of it all has arisen the socialist party
of Illinois as the leading standard bearer of the radical ele-
ments. The origin of this party in Illinois may be dated back
as early as 1896. Up to this time socialism in the United
States had been more or less of an exotic bearing the stamp
largely of German Marxism. Now, however, it developed
in the western country and grew directly out of American
conditions.
Eugene V. Debs had become a socialist while serving his
prison sentence growing out of the Pullman strike, largely
through the efforts of Victor L. Berger. In the fall of 1896
he became the organizer for a visionary group known as the
35 Hoagland, Wage Bargaining on the Vessels of the Great Lakes, chap-
ters 4 and 5.
36 Report of the State Board of Arbitration, 1910, p. 52-63.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 173
Brotherhood of the Cooperative Commonwealth. Its object
was to colonize a state with cooperators until they should
become numerous enough to capture the political power of
the state and turn the whole into a cooperative common-
wealth. 37 Two or three other organizations were later merged
with this, including the American Railway Union, and the
new body took the name of the Social Democracy of America.
The name of the Railway Times was changed to that of The
Social Democrat, which became the official organ of the body,
and it was moved from Terre Haute, Indiana, to Chicago
where the headquarters were to be situated. Debs was elected
chairman of the executive board.
At the very first convention of the new party, held in
Chicago in June, 1898, a split took place between the more
Utopian cooperationists and the socialists who believed in
political action. Headed by Debs, Jesse Cox, and Seymour
Stedman, of Chicago, the latter faction bolted the meeting
to found still another organization, the social democratic party
of America. This was the parent of the present socialist party,
which may therefore claim to have been born in Illinois.
There was in existence at this time another older socialist
group, the socialist labor party, which, as pointed out above, 38
had allied itself with the populists in 1 894. Between this group
and the new social democratic party there were, however,
certain fundamental differences, the most important of which
was the attitude of the two organizations toward labor unions.
The socialist labor party condemned craft unionism, favored
the organization of separate socialist labor organizations, and
attempted in the nineties to organize a socialistic Trade and
Labor Alliance as a rival of the American Federation of Labor.
The social democratic party (now the socialist party) on the
other hand was on friendly terms with the trade-unions. Thus,
3T Railway Times, January i, 1897. As a result of this movement the
colony of " Equality " was organized in 1897 in Skagit county, Washington, with
620 acres. In 1898 the colony became autonomous sir.ce which time the brother-
hood has had merely a nominal existence.
38 See p. 162.
174 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
one of the two socialists in the forty-ninth general assembly
of Illinois, writing of his activities in the session of 1913,
stated that he was in close touch with the labor representa-
tives present in Springfield during the session. "Thus I had
come to be regarded as speaking not merely for the two Social-
ists in the house but in a sense as a representative of the labor
movement in the state which of course gave considerable
strength to my position." 39
In 1 899 there was a split in the national socialist labor party
which soon spread to Chicago. Section Chicago of the national
party declared its independence, 40 and thereby drew the ire
of the alliance faction which organized a new section. Al-
though it was stated at the time that the new section was
organized with only ten members, it is through this group
that the socialist labor party of Illinois has continued its obscure
existence down to this day. In 1899 it polled about 1,100
votes; in 1900, only 400; and in 1901, 650.
Meantime a split had also occurred in the social demo-
cratic party. The question of a union with the socialist labor
party had come up, but as it insisted upon retaining its name
for the combined organization, it looked as if a union could
not be secured. 41 The party thereupon divided into the union-
ists and no-unionists. In May, 1900, the no-union faction met
in state convention at Chicago and nominated a state ticket but
retained Debs and Harriman, previously nominated by the
entire party, on its presidential ticket. In July the union fac-
tion met together with the union socialist labor party, indorsed
Debs and Harriman for president and vice president respec-
tively, nominated a state ticket, and adopted the compromise
name socialist party of Illinois. The folly of uniting upon
S9 Madsen, "Work in the Illinois Legislature," American Labor Year Book,
1916, p. 108.
40 Workers' Call, July 22, 1899. This paper first appeared in March u of
this year. It was published " for and under the control of Section Chicago of
the Socialist Labor Party of Illinois by the Socialist Publishing Association, a
corporation without capital stock, the whole revenue of which must be expended
for socialist propaganda." A. M. Simons was editor.
41 Ibid., February 10, 17, 1900; Social Democratic Herald, April 7, 1900.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 175
national candidates and fighting each other on local candi-
dates finally impressed even the warring factions of the two
parties and they agreed to work together for the campaign.
Their united effort secured 6,752 votes at the fall elections.
In September, 1901, after considerable bickering, the local
socialist factions in Illinois met and united permanently under
the name of the socialist party of Illinois. 42 The Social
Democratic Herald, the official organ of the former no-union
factions, was moved to Milwaukee; The Workers' Call, the
official organ of the late union group, was suspended; and in
place of these the Chicago Socialist was established as the
organ of the new party.
Illinois claimed 6,004 regular members of the socialist
party in 1915, but the party ticket had received 50,607 votes
at the last election. In this year there were 44 socialist
elected officials holding office throughout the state in the fol-
lowing capacities: I mayor, 18 aldermen, 2 state legislators,
5 school officials, and 18 unclassified. 43
While the workers were struggling for the improvement
of their conditions by means of their own organizations, the
state of Illinois was legislating in their behalf in a variety of
ways. As the mining industry of the state developed earlier
than any other except agriculture and as this is a peculiarly
hazardous business, it is only natural that legislation for the
protection of miners should be among the first to be passed.
The first general law on this subject was enacted in 1872, and
covered the general subjects of ventilation, escapement shafts,
bore holes, signalling, hoisting, explosions, and accidents. This
applied to all mines in which more than ten men were em-
ployed, and its enforcement was placed in the hands of the
county surveyors, who were constituted ex officio inspectors of
mines. As this did not work very well, county mine inspectors
were provided for by the act of 1877.
Additional safeguards to the health and safety of persons
42 Workers' Call, September i, 1900, September 28, 1901.
43 American Socialist, January 22, 1916; Appeal Almanac, 1916, p. 195;
American Labor Year Book, 1916, p. 105.
176 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
employed in mines were introduced in 1883; the minimum
age limit for child labor was raised from 12 to 14 years; and
the act was made to apply to all mines. A board of examiners
and five state mining inspectors instead of the county inspec-
tors were provided for. Frequent amendments were made to
this law and in 1899 a general revision of mining legislation
was effected. By this act the powers of the state mining board
were considerably enlarged and better provisions made for
the health and safety of the miners. In 1910 a mining inves-
tigation commission was appointed which codified and revised
the various laws relating to mining and introduced some new
features. 44 The measures recommended by this body were
enacted into law with little change by the legislature, and were
somewhat further extended in 1913. Of this legislation Gov-
ernor Deneen was able to say in his message to the legislature
in the latter year, " The mining laws of the state have been
completely revised and are now considered the most advanced
either in this country or elsewhere." 45
The mining legislation goes into great detail in laying
down specific requirements as to conditions which must be
maintained in mines so as to safeguard the lives and safety
of the men employed therein. These requirements deal with
the sinking of shafts, hoisting equipment, stairways and cages,
light, signals, safety lamps, ventilation, refuge places, and a
number of other points. Another group of provisions compels
certain precautions to be observed for the prevention and con-
trolling of fires and prevention of loss of life from fires in
coal mines. These cover such points as water supply, pipe
and hose connections, automatic sprinklers, fire extinguishers,
telephones, passageways, and similar details. In some of the
requirements, such as providing telephones, Illinois was a pio-
neer, and in all of the legislation was well abreast of the best
legislation on the subject.
Other acts provided for the testing and stamping of blasting
44 Report of the Mining Investigation Commission, March, 1911.
45 Governor's Biennial Message to the Forty-Eighth General Assembly,
January 8, 1913, p. 71.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 177
powder to be used in the mines, required shot firers to be fur-
nished for all mines and laid down careful rules for firing of
shots, prevented the employment of women and children in
mines, called for frequent inspection of mines by state inspec-
tors, and in other ways attempted to lessen the dangers and
increase the well-being of those engaged in mining. A state
mining board was established which was to examine persons
wishing to be mine inspectors, to publish an annual statistical
report and to administer certain features of the foregoing
mining legislation. The number of state mine inspectors was
increased to twelve and upon them falls the duty of seeing
that the laws are enforced.
Steps have also been taken to make sure that the men
employed as miners shall be competent and trustworthy. In
1897 it was provided that before a man could work by him-
self he must have had two years practical work as a miner.
In 1908 examining boards were created in each county in
which coal mining was carried on, but in 1913 a single state
miners examining board was established in their place. Any
person wishing to be employed as a miner in the state must
take an examination and obtain from this board a certificate
of competency. In such a dangerous industry as mining, such
a safeguard is peculiarly necessary.
The hazardous nature of the industry also led, in 1910,
to the establishment of mine rescue stations, for the purpose
of providing prompt and efficient means of fighting mine fires
and saving lives and property jeopardized by fire. Three sta-
tions have been established in the northern, central, and south-
ern coalfields of the state. Finally in 1911 the last step in
this program of mining legislation was taken by the establish-
ment of miners' and mechanics' institutes. The purpose of
these institutes is by education to promote the technical effi-
ciency of persons engaged in mining or mechanical pursuits.
Courses have been organized in a number of mining towns,
lectures given, and, beginning in 1914, a short course has been
offered at the University of Illinois.
178 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Another step in labor legislation was taken in 1879 by the
creation of a bureau of labor statistics. This seems to have been
done as the result of the report of a special committee on
labor which reported to the house of representatives in March
of that year. 46 For forty years this bureau published biennial
statistical reports relating to all departments of labor in the
state. In 1909 a new act extended the duties of the board so
as to make their statistical report cover not only labor condi-
tions but also commercial and manufacturing conditions as
well. The bureau has undertaken in its discretion various inves-
tigations upon subjects connected with the welfare of the labor-
ing classes. For instance in 1894 and 1896 it discussed the
subject of taxation, in 1900 kindergartens and manual training,
in 1908 public ownership of municipal utilities. While the
statistical matter is often undigested the reports as a whole
throw valuable light upon the conditions and progress of labor
in the state for almost forty years.
The increasing industrialization which was going on soon
called for more active intervention on the part of the legis-
lature to correct growing evils than by the mere collection of
information. The abuse which first attracted attention in con-
nection with the development of manufactures was that of
child labor.
The first child labor law had been enacted in 1891, but as
no department or any particular officer was charged with the
duty of enforcing it, the law remained a dead letter. The
employment of children under thirteen years of age was for-
bidden by this act; and school boards were authorized to issue
employment certificates for children over the age of thirteen
who had attended eight weeks of school. The act applied to
stores, shops, factories, and manufacturing establishments.
The first important child labor law and one which really
marked the introduction of a new era in labor legislation was
that creating a department of factories and workshops, ap-
proved June 17, 1893. The prevailing unsanitary conditions
48 Reports General Assembly, 1879, i session.
179
in the garment trade seem to have prompted the passage of
this act, for Chicago had just experienced an epidemic of con-
tagious diseases the origin of which was traced to the sweat-
shops. Indeed, the act was entitled "An act to regulate the
manufacture of clothing, wearing apparel, and other articles
in this state." Incidentally child labor was regulated, the
minimum age limit below which children were prohibited to
work being raised from thirteen to fourteen years in factories,
workshops, and sweatshops. For children between fourteen
and sixteen years of age, affidavits by the parents or guardians,
certifying to their age, and certificates from physicians certify-
ing to their physical fitness for their work, were prescribed.
The employment of women was limited to eight hours a day,
but this provision was later declared unconstitutional by the
state supreme court. 47 Finally, the act established the depart-
ment of factories and workshops, to which was intrusted the
enforcement of the provisions just enumerated.
The first report of the factory inspector showed that most
of the efforts of that office were being directed toward the
enforcement of the child labor provisions. Florence Kelley
was appointed chief inspector by Governor Altgeld, and
brought to the work knowledge, sympathy, and courage. Dur-
ing the first five months, 2,452 places were inspected, in which
68,081 persons were employed, of whom 6,576, or 9.7 per
cent, were children between the ages of fourteen and sixteen. 48
This act was extended in 1897 to offices, laundries,
mercantile institutions, and stores, thereby taking in most
trades and occupations where children were employed. 49 At
the same time the hours of employment of children under
sixteen years of age was limited to ten hours a day and sixty
a week. The control of the garment trades and of the sweat-
shops was relegated to a subordinate position, while the regu-
lation of child labor became the main object of the new
legislation.
47 Ritchie v. People, 755 Illinois, 98.
48 Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1893, p. 90, 122.
49 Laws of 1897, p. 90-91.
i8o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
But there were several weaknesses in these early acts.
Night work of young persons was not regulated, nor were
sufficient safeguards thrown about their employment in occu-
pations dangerous to life or detrimental to their health or
morals. But perhaps the greatest weakness was the provision
which permitted children to be employed upon the affidavit
of their parents, a provision which encouraged perjury
rather than prevented child labor. In the year 1901 it was
estimated that there were 5,000 more children under six-
teen years of age employed in the state than during the
previous year, and in 1902 there were 15,000 children work-
ing in Chicago alone, of whom 3,000 were employed on false
affidavits. 50
As a result of vigorous agitation a special committee was
appointed to draft a new child labor law, of which Edgar T.
Davies, chief factory inspector, was chairman. The bill drawn
up by this committee, with some modifications, was finally
passed by the legislature with only one dissenting vote, and be-
came a law on May 15, I9O3. 51 The scope of the regulation of
child labor was greatly broadened by this act, and many new
features introduced, of which the more important were the
following: the employment of children under the age of four-
teen in any occupa-tion is forbidden when the schools are in
session. Their employment at any time is forbidden in places
of amusement where intoxicating liquors are sold, or in any
mercantile establishment, store, office, hotel, laundry, manu-
facturing establishment, bowling alley, passenger or freight
elevator, factory or workshop, or as messenger or driver. In
fact, agriculture and the street trades are almost the only
occupations not closed to children under fourteen. The law
also forbids the employment of children in certain designated
occupations over twenty being specifically enumerated
which are generally regarded as hazardous, and also their
60 Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1907, p. 15.
61 Ibid., 16. This striking approval was due largely to the efficient work of
Miss Jane Addams and her coworkers during the debate on the measure.
Laws of 1903, p. 187 ff.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 181
employment in other places which may be considered danger-
ous to life or limb or injurious to health or morals. Acting
under this provision the factory inspector ruled that coal mines
were dangerous, and on December 9, 1904, child labor in
Illinois mines ended, some 2,200 children being discharged on
that date. 52 The hours of labor for children under fourteen
years of age are limited to eight in any one day and forty-
eight per week, and no child is permitted to work before 7 A. M.
nor after 6 P. M. Instead of the employment certificate prp-
vided for under the old law, an age and school certificate must
be secured by all children under sixteen, to be sworn to by the
parent or guardian and approved by designated school author-
ities. These certificates must be kept on file by the employer
and a register of all children employed must also be kept. The
constitutionality of this act was upheld by the United States
supreme court on December I, 19 13. 53
The advance marked by these measures, it was declared
by Mrs. Kelley, " amounts to a revolution, and has placed
Illinois in 1904 where Massachusetts has stood since 1894,"
while another official stated that " Illinois now has the best
laws in the country to protect its children." 54 The percentage
of child labor in the state was decreased in the six years
between 1902 and 1908 from 3.7 to 1.3 per cent, which was
claimed by the chief factory inspector of Illinois in the latter
year to be the lowest percentage of child labor of any state
in the union. 53
In spite of this laudation and the undoubted good results
of this legislation, especially in the prohibition of labor for
children under fourteen years of age and the institution of
the eight-hour day, there still remained gaps or weaknesses in
52 Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1907, p. 15.
53 Sturges and Burn Manufacturing Company <v. Beauchamp, 231 United
States, 320 (324).
54 Kelley, " Has Illinois the Best Laws in the Country for the Protection of
Children?" American Journal of Sociology, 10:300. W. L. Bodine, in Juvenile
Court Record, August, 1904. Mr. Bodine was superintendent of compulsory
education in Chicago.
55 Davies, "The Present Situation in Illinois," Annals of the American
Academy of Sociology and Political Science, 33:154-155 (June, 1909).
182 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the child labor laws. One was the inapplicability of the acts
to newsboys and other street trades. Another was the possi-
bility of illiterate children who had attained the age of sixteen
being permitted to work without any provision for their fur-
ther education. As a result of this defect Illinois in 1904
ranked fifteenth among the states in illiteracy. 56 But in spite
of these drawbacks great progress had been made in the
protection of child labor, and from one of the worst states
in this respect, Illinois now took rank with the half dozen best
states in the union.
In addition to the child labor laws, other legislation has
been passed directed against specific abuses and designed to
protect the health and safety of the workers. An act to compel
the use of blowers on metal polishing machines was passed on
June n, 1897. This law aims to protect the health of metal
polishers, grinders, and buffers by requiring an efficient exhaust
system to be installed above. every emery wheel to carry away
the dust from grinding, thus preventing the men from con-
tracting tuberculosis and similar diseases. The factory inspec-
tor reports 57 that there is little difficulty in inducing employers
to install suction systems, but that there has been difficulty in
having the systems maintained in a state of real efficiency.
During the year ending June 30, 1916, there were made 1,104
visits to 339 shops and factories throughout the state, of
which 329 were located in Chicago. These shops employed
3,122 persons at metal polishing operations.
A fire escape law was also passed on July I, 1897, repeal-
ing the previous law of 1885 on this subject. By this act all
buildings more than four stories high, and all buildings more
than two stories high used for manufacturing purposes, hotels,
dormitories, schools, seminaries, hospitals, asylums, and all
public halls were required to be equipped with a sufficient
number of fire escapes. The law was bitterly opposed by the
56 Kelley, " Has Illinois the Best Laws in the Country for the Protection of
Children?" American Journal of Sociology, 10:299-314.
57 Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1915-1916, p. 41.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 183
Manufacturers' Association of Illinois, and it was found almost
impossible to enforce. 58 In 1899 it was repealed.
Except for the new child labor law of 1903 little factory
legislation was passed for a decade, but in 1907 two additional
acts were passed aimed at evils in particular occupations. The
butterine and ice cream inspection act compelled manufacturers
of these products to maintain their establishments in a thor-
oughly healthful and sanitary condition. The structural iron
law was designed to protect the lives of persons working on
structural iron buildings and of those passing beneath them.
Both these measures were approved on June 3, 1907. In this
connection may be mentioned also the safety appliance act of
May 12, 1905, which required the use of safety appliances,
automatic couplers, and other devices for the protection of
railroad employees and the traveling public. The act created
the office of inspector of safety appliances to enforce compli-
ance by railroads with the terms of the act.
The next session of the legislature passed two new meas-
ures, the first of which is commonly known as the health,
safety, and comfort act, approved June 4, 1909, and the other
as the woman's ten-hour law, approved June 15, 1909. The
former of these measures provides in general for the health,
safety, and comfort of all employees engaged in factories,
mercantile establishments, mills, and workshops throughout
the state. It goes into great detail in providing for the main-
tenance of proper conditions in these establishments, and cov-
ers such points as safeguarding machinery, elevators, eating
rooms, seats, temperature, air space, gases, dust, fire exits,
lights, water closets, washing facilities, and similar necessities.
After the supreme court of Illinois in 1895 had held
unconstitutional the act of 1893 providing an eight-hour day
for women, no further attempts to limit the long hours of
labor for women were made for fourteen years. But in 1909
an act was passed which forbade the employment of women
more than ten hours per day in mechanical establishments,
58 Laws of I#p7, p. 222; Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1898, p. 7.
1 84 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
factories, or laundries. Two years later this list was greatly
extended by adding a large number of other places of employ-
ment, as mercantile establishments, hotels, restaurants, tele-
graph or telephone offices, places of amusement, express, trans-
portation or public utilities companies, common carriers, and
public institutions. While this law marks an improvement, it
is far behind the standard of eight hours established by the
laws of a great number of other states.
Another law looking to the improvement of the condition
of working women was the "mothers' pension act," which
provides a pension fund to enable poor mothers to keep their
children at home instead of sending them to charitable insti-
tutions.
The occupational disease law of 1911 was pioneer legis-
lation in America along this line, and followed an exhaustive
investigation and report of a committee appointed two years
previously to study the subject of industrial diseases in this
state. This law aims to protect the health of employees in
certain dusty and poisonous trades harmful to their health,
the most dangerous probably being the lead trades. Separate
clothes, lockers, and bathing facilities must be provided for
men engaged in these occupations; poisonous fumes and dust
must be carried off by adequate devices; and employees are
forbidden to take food into the workrooms. Monthly phys-
ical examinations of all employees exposed to industrial dis-
eases must be made by competent physicians at the expense of
the employer. During the year ending June 30, 1916, the
factory inspector reported that of 8,630 employees examined,
157 were suffering from occupational diseases, of whom 138
were sick from lead poisoning. 59
The principle of this legislation was carried further by
the enactment of the washroom law of I9I3, 60 which com-
pels employers in certain occupations where workmen become
covered with dirt and perspiration, as in foundries and machine
59 Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1915-1916, p. 39.
60 Laws of 1913, p. 359.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 185
shops, to provide sanitary washrooms with hot and cold
water.
The so-called basement law, approved June 29, 1915, was
passed to secure more healthful working conditions for em-
ployees in certain industries by forbidding them to be carried
on in basements. The employments named are metal polish-
ing, grinding, plating, and dipping, in all of which good venti-
lation is essential to health.
All these laws are enforced by the department of fac-
tory inspectors, whose duties have steadily grown with the
increase in the number of statutory provisions safeguarding
the lives and safety of the workers. The office of state factory
inspector was first created by the act to regulate the manu-
facture of clothing, in 1893. As authorized then the depart-
ment was to consist of a chief inspector, an assistant, and ten
deputies, of whom half were to be women; in 1916 it was
composed of a chief, assistant chief, physician, attorney, thirty
deputy inspectors, and a staff of clerks, stenographers, and spe-
cial investigators. 61 The inspections for this year were 76,593,
in almost sixty-five thousand establishments. During the
twenty years of its existence between 1893 and 1913 the total
expenditures of the department amounted to $742,750, or at
the rate of about twelve cents per capita per annum for the
employees who come under the scope of the acts enumerated.
Other labor legislation has been passed which is not enforci-
ble by the factory inspector, but only by criminal penalties.
Such are the child labor provisions of the criminal code, the
specific provisions in the mining law regarding labor by women
and children, the semimonthly payment of wages by corpo-
rations, the protection of chauffeurs, and masons' examining
boards. 02
By these various enactments the state of Illinois has em-
phatically put the stamp of its approval upon the principle of
61 Report of the Illinois Factory Inspectors, 1915-1916, p. 18-19.
6 - Illinois Factory Inspection Bulletin, volume i, number 2, p. 15; Laws of
1913, p. 334, 356, 358. See Dodd, "A Report on the Administration of Labor and
Mining Legislation," Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 511.
i86 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
interference with unrestricted private business. It has done
this in the name of the moral and physical health of society,
and has gradually but steadily enlarged the scope of its protec-
tive legislation from children in a few selected industries to
practically all workers in an ever-increasing list of occupations.
The enforcement of this legislation has probably not kept pace
with its enactment, owing to the insufficient number of inspec-
tors. Most of the work of inspection is, moreover, done in
Chicago and the remainder of the state is comparatively neg-
lected. While the record is one of which the citizens of Illinois
may justly be proud, it is evident that any slackening of
endeavor will result in retrogression.
In addition to improving the conditions of work in cer-
tain specified occupations, or for certain groups of workers,
the legislature has also sought to provide the machinery by
which disputes between labor and capital may be avoided or
settled. The state board of arbitration was created in 1895.
This body has powers of investigation, of conciliation, and of
arbitration. In any dispute involving not less than twenty-
five persons the board is required to " endeavor by media-
tion to effect an amicable settlement," or it may act as a board
of arbitration upon application by the employer or employees,
and finally in 1901 it was given authority to conduct an inde-
pendent investigation in any case where the general public is
likely to suffer injury or inconvenience.
The board of arbitration was established soon after the
great railway strike of 1894, in response to a popular demand
that something should be done to prevent a repetition of its
excesses. It has been somewhat more successful in its attempts
at conciliation than of arbitration, but apparently has in no
instance made use of its powers of investigation and report,
which in Massachusetts and other states have proven so effec-
tive in bringing public pressure to bear upon the party at fault.
The results of the board's twenty odd years of work in Illinois
hardly justify its continued existence.
One of the gravest evils of our modern industrial system
LABOR ORGANIZATION 187
is that of unemployment; and this evil too the legislature has
attempted to meet and cure, in part at least, by the establish-
ment of free employment offices. By an act approved April
17, i899, 63 free employment offices were created, one in each
city of not less than fifty thousand population, and three in
each city containing a population of one million or over.
Accordingly offices have been established throughout the state
as follows: three in Chicago (1899), and one each in Peoria
(1901), East St. Louis (1907), Springfield (1909), Rock
Island-Moline (1913), and Rockford (1913). For the year
ending September 30, 1914, these eight offices had 70,230.
applications for employment and 61,666 applications for help
on the part of employers. Positions were secured for 56,537,
or 80.5 per cent of those who applied. 64 For an industrial
state like Illinois this is not a very good showing and indicates
that most of the work of this sort is still being performed by
private employment agencies. A majority of the positions
applied for and filled were unskilled manual labor on the part
of men and domestic service on the part of women.
Hand in hand with the creation of free public employment
offices went the licensing and control of private employment
agencies. The act of 1899 provided for the licensing of these
agencies by the secretary of state upon payment of an annual
license fee of $200. In 1909 the control was transferred to
the state board of labor commissioners and the fee was re-
duced to $50 in cities of over 50,000 inhabitants and to $25
in all other cities. Various provisions exist as to amount of
fees, sending applicants to places where no employment exists
or to undesirable places, and similar matters in which abuses
existed. Inspection is provided for, but has practically not
been enforced outside of Chicago.
The capstone was placed upon this protective arch of
labor legislation which had been building during the previous
generation by the passage in 1911 of the workmen's compen-
63 This law was superseded by a similar act in 1903, amended in 1913.
04 Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics of Illinois: Free Employment
Offices, 1914, p. 8.
i88 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
sation act. The purpose of this measure was to s'ecure com-
pensation for employees who were injured in the course of
their work, without the necessity of their suing for damages
in a court of law, a method which was both too expensive and
too protracted for the average worker to avail himself of.
The passage of the act followed a long agitation and dis-
cussion of the subject, in which effective service was rendered
by Professor Charles R. Henderson of the University of
Chicago and his coworkers. It was clearly shown that under
modern conditions the losses involved in industrial accidents
must be borne by the industry itself, and that it is neither just
nor expedient that the burden be placed upon the shoulders of
the workers and their dependents.
The first workmen's compensation act of 1911 applied
only to certain designated employments, but the new law of
1913 as amended in 1917 has enlarged the list and introduced
other improvements. Certain extra hazardous employments
are enumerated to which the act applies automatically, such as
building, excavating, electrical work, transportation, mining,
manufacturing of explosives, and similar dangerous businesses.
Employers engaged in other industries may elect to come within
the provisions of the act. In the case of accidents to employees
of all such employers, resulting in death or disability, certain
fixed compensations are provided. The administration of the
law is intrusted to an industrial board. For the calendar year
1915 the total amount paid as compensation in 16,869 acci-
dents amounted to $1,292, 735. 65
A few other general laws for the protection of labor
which need not be discussed in detail may be added here to
complete the picture. Provision is made for apprenticing
children until they arrive at the age of sixteen. Barbers and
horseshoers must secure certificates of registration from boards
65 Report of the Industrial Board of Illinois, 1916, p. 37. Statistics of indus-
trial accidents had been reported to the bureau of labor statistics under an act
of 1907, but it has recently been little more than a farce, owing to the transfer
of this duty to the industrial board. During the year 1915 the bureau reported
only 1,430 industrial accidents in the state. Report of the Bureau of Labor
Statistics: Industrial Accidents in Illinois, 1915, p. 9.
LABOR ORGANIZATION 189
of examiners created for this purpose. Convict labor shall
not be employed so as to compete with free labor; but con-
victs may be employed in manufacture of road material and
machinery and under certain circumstances may be employed
on the public roads. Eight hours shall constitute a legal day's
work, where there is no agreement to the contrary. The wages
of a head of a family to the amount of fifteen dollars per week
shall be exempt from garnishment; this was an increase from
eight dollars. The pay of mechanics and miners shall consti-
tute a first lien upon property for materials or service furnished.
Wages shall be paid in bankable currency, in full on pay day,
and in the case of corporations for pecuniary profit such pay
days shall be at least semimonthly.
IX. CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT AND
REVISION
THE political history of Illinois during the quarter century
since 1893 may be to a considerable extent visualized in
the concrete proposals for governmental and political reform
which have involved some alteration of the state constitution.
It is therefore of importance to trace the development of pro-
posals for constitutional amendment and revision during this
period, not only from the standpoint of the form of the basic
law of the state, but also for the purpose of considering, at least
incidentally, such concrete measures as the proposed reforms in
connection with taxation, woman suffrage, local government,
short ballot, initiative and referendum, and other matters. To
the constitution of 1870, seven amendments have been adopted,
only two of which have been adopted during the period since
1893. The history of proposed and adopted amendments to
the constitution of 1870 may be divided into three periods: the
first extending from that date to the passage of the official ballot
act of 1891, the second from 1891 to the passage of the act of
1899 providing for a separate ballot for proposed constitu-
tional amendments and other measures, and the third from
1899 to the present time.
The agitation in favor of constitutional amendment and
revision has been more constant and insistent during the last
twenty-five years. At the very beginning of this period, in
1893, Governor Altgeld in his inaugural address suggested the
need of constitutional revision in the following words: "There
is a wide-spread conviction that the present revenue system of
our State results in the greatest inequalities and injustice in
the matter of taxation Various measures in rela-
tion to it will no doubt be presented to your consideration, the
190
most important of which is, perhaps, the question whether any
comprehensive change can be made without a revision of our
Constitution. In the past, our State has revised its Constitu-
tion at intervals of thirty and twenty-two years. A number
of questions have arisen in the development of recent years re-
lating to various subjects on which legislation is needed, but
where there seem to be constitutional difficulties in the way.
This is especially true of the revenue system and of the ques-
tion of enlarging the elective franchise, on which latter sub-
ject the law is left in a condition of uncertainty that is not
creditable to the intelligence of our people." 1
The suggestion of Governor Altgeld bore fruit in a joint
resolution introduced in the session of 1893, which thus recited
the conditions calling for remedy by a constitutional conven-
tion: "We are prevented in a great measure from redeeming
the pledges we made to the People of the State . . . .
by constitutional obstacles and restrictions; and Whereas, The
inadequacy of that constitution to meet the demands of present
and future conditions has caused bitter complaint among the
people and much just discontentment; and Whereas, There
are weighty social and economic issues persistently pressing
upon us and demanding solution, and yet cannot be squarely
met and intelligently solved with the present constitution in the
way; and Whereas, The present revenue system is flagrantly
unfair, unequal and, consequently, unjust in its operation; and
Whereas, Our present judicial system is complicated, cumber-
some and subject to gross abuse in unnecessary delay in our
courts, thus unduly shielding the guilty from deserved punish-
ment and working injustice to the innocent, especially dis-
criminating against the poor man." 2
This joint resolution, though failing in the house, passed
the senate by a vote of 37 to i. A joint resolution of a some-
what similar tenor was introduced in the house of representa-
tives upon which 67 members voted favorably and 64 in the
1 Senate Journal, 1893, p. 121.
2 Ibid., 265.
192 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
negative. Having failed to receive the concurrence of two-
thirds of all members elected, as required by the constitution,
the resolution was lost. In an editorial published at this time,
the Chicago Tribune declared that there was no special need
or general demand for a constitutional convention, but the
favorable vote upon the proposition in both branches of the
legislature would seem to indicate that there was considerable
sentiment in the state in favor of it, even at that early period. 3
A joint resolution for calling a constitutional convention
was also introduced in the session of 1899, but it did not come
to a vote. 4 At about the same time the reasons against a con-
stitutional convention were thus voiced by the Chicago Tribune:
" There is no demand heard from the people for constitutional
revision, therefore they would take no keen, general interest in
the election of the persons who were to do the work of re-
vision. Consequently the same bosses and the same interests
that control the election of members of the Legislature would
nominate and elect members of a constitutional convention.
. . The more this question of calling a constitutional
convention is discussed the more strenuous will be the opposi-
tion to it Illinois has had an Allen law Legisla-
ture. It must not have an Allen law constitutional con-
vention." 5
This view, however, left out of account the fact that the
members of a constitutional convention would not be chosen
according to the plan of minority representation which con-
tributed much to the lack of popular control over the lower
house of the legislature; that it would consist of but one house
or body instead of two, as in the case of the legislature, and
therefore there would be less possibility of shifting responsibil-
ity for action or non-action from one branch to another; and,
finally, that the greater importance of the powers of a consti-
tutional convention would probably have aroused the interest
3 Senate Journal, 1893, 881; House Journal, 1893, p. 542-543; Chicago
Tribune, June 15, 1893.
* Senate Journal, 1899, p. 44.
5 Chicago Tribune, January 30, 1899.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 193
of the people in the election of members to such an extent that
a better class of delegates would have been sent to a constitu-
tional convention than are ordinarily elected to the legislature.
Aloreover, the increasing complexity and cumbrousness of local
government in Cook county emphasized the need of changes
which only a constitutional convention could well effect. At all
events, two years later the Tribune changed its attitude and
came out strongly in favor of a convention. The reasons as-
signed for this position were that a new constitution was needed
in order to give Chicago a larger measure of home rule, in
order to bring about the consolidation of the various local gov-
ernments in Cook county the abolition of townships within
the city of Chicago, and the consolidation of the taxing bodies
in the county. Such a scheme of reform, known compre-
hensively as the " Greater Chicago plan," was said to be impos-
sible under the existing constitution. 6
At about the same time a canvass of the members of the
legislature was made in order to determine how they stood on
a constitutional convention. Of the 64 who replied, 41 favored
a convention, 14 were against it, and 9 were undecided. Prob-
ably most of those who failed to reply were opposed to the
convention, for later in the same session the resolution for a
convention was killed in the house by a vote of 52 to 76 in spite
of the advocacy of the convention resolution by the speaker of
the house, Lawrence Y. Sherman. The agitation in favor of a
convention, however, continued throughout the year 19027*" A
committee of the State Bar Association reported unanimously
in that year in favor of calling a convention. The report
enumerated many of the reforms in the constitution which had
been sought and attacked the idea that the desired changes
could be made by separate amendment. "Theoretically," it
was said, " the changes in the constitution necessary for the
enactment of the reforms spoken of may be obtained by amend-
ments. But the history of attempts to obtain the adoption by
the legislature of propositions for amendments to the constitu-
8 Chicago Tribune, March 8, 1901.
i 9 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tion shows that this method is extremely difficult, not to say
entirely impracticable. Practically, we might have to wait
thirty years or more before effecting the changes deemed neces-
sary or desirable. There is only one alternative left, and that
is a constitutional convention. A proposal for revision has a
better chance of success in the legislature, because it is not
antagonistic to any plan of change championed by any member,
and because it does not require the members to study any par-
ticular scheme of governmental policy, leaving all such things
to the convention." 7
'The great change in economic and industrial conditions
since the adoption of the constitution in 1870 was recognized
as a leading argument in favor of a convention. In 1870 the
state was distinctly agricultural. Thirty years later it had be-
come very largely a manufacturing and commercial community,
" It could not be expected that a constitutional convention, con-
vened to frame an instrument for the Illinois of that day, could
foresee and make adequate provision for the totally different
Illinois of today, including a mighty city the center of intri-
cate and diversified activities and occupations, the source of un-
measured political energy, as well as weakness and danger,
confronting new necessities with which small communities are
unacquainted." 8
In the same year, 1902, the Chicago Tribune went so far
as to declare that the constitution "has outlived its usefulness.
It is not the ark of the covenant. It has no sacred qualities.
We may touch it without dropping dead." It was pointed out
that many changes were needed in order to provide for the
changing needs of the growing city, particularly consolidated
government, a new taxing system, and a raising of the debt
limitation. These improvements, however, could not be
introduced because the inflexible, " rockribbed, ironclad, re-
morseless constitution" stands in the way. "Apparently the
opposition to a new constitutional convention is strong.
7 Chicago Tribune, July 18, 1902.
8 Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar Association, 1901, part i, p. 59.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 195
. . . . But it will have to give way in the end. Chicago
has simply got to be taken care of. The armor of 1870 binds
it painfully, impedes its movements, stunts its growth, and
arrests its development. The boy has outgrown his clothes.
He wants a man's garments." 9
After 1902, the movement for a constitutional convention
seems to have temporarily somewhat subsided, although it con-
tinued to be urged in some quarters and resolutions calling for
a convention were occasionally introduced in the legislature.
During the decade following that date, the movement for con-
stitutional change took the guise principally of agitating in
favor of the adoption of separate constitutional amendments.
Indeed, the agitation in favor of separate specific amendments
of one sort or another had continued almost uninterruptedly
since shortly after the adoption of the constitution of 1870.
The partial subsidence after 1902 of the agitation in favor of
a convention seems to have been due in part to the uniform
failure in the general assembly of resolutions calling for a con-
vention and to the apparent hopelessness of getting such a reso-
lution through that body. There was also another circum-
stance which may have accounted for it in part. /The principal
need for constitutional change was felt in Chicago rather than
in the country districts because of the more rapid growth of the
city. /Comparatively speaking, the country districts were still
content to live under the constitution of 1870, and the consent
of their representatives in the general assembly must, of
course, be secured before a convention could be called, because
a two-thirds vote in the general assembly is required by the
constitution for that purpose. Although Chicago thus felt the
greater need for a constitutional convention and was specially
desirous of securing a greater measure of home rule, never-
theless, there was some fear manifested in the metropolis that
a constitutional convention might be dangerous to the city, as
it might lead to a reduction of the city's representation in the
general assembly or to a definite limitation upon it. In 1901
9 Chicago Tribune, September 22, 1902.
196 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the Chicago Tribune had declared editorially that " If the
people should vote in 1902 to authorize the calling of a con-
stitutional convention the following year it would be impossible
to tell in advance who would control it or what use the ruling
element might make of its power. The outcome might be a
decrease of the legislative representation of the city, unaccom-
panied by an increase in the measure of home rule to be
enjoyed by it. Sensible Chicagoans will not walk into a
trap."/ 10
That the view that the country districts might attempt
to limit Chicago's legislative representation was not without
some foundation was indicated by a resolution introduced in
the senate in 1901 for a constitutional amendment limiting the
representation from Cook county in the house and senate to
one-third of the total membership. The resolution was passed
in the senate by a vote of 34 to 12, or the necessary two-thirds,
but in the house, where it received 93 favorable votes to 48
negative, it lacked nine votes of the necessary two-thirds. 11
It was said that the country members of the general assembly
were alarmed over the rapid growth of population in Cook
county and the possible increase in representation that was
involved. 12
In his message to the general assembly in January, 1903,
Governor Yates recommended that no steps be taken in the
direction of calling a constitutional convention, and expressed
the opinion that any necessary constitutional change could be
made by the method of a separate amendment. 13 Both the
convention method and the separate amendment method, how-
ever, have been hedged around with extreme difficulties by the
10 Chicago Tribune, March 9, 1901. This statement was made only a few
weeks after the Chicago city council had adopted a resolution in favor of calling
a constitutional convention. Ibid., February 12, 1901.
^Senate Journal, 1901, p. 258-259, 301-302; Chicago Tribune, May 3, 1901.
This vote, however, cannot be verified by reference to the House Journal.
12 Chicago Tribune, March 2, 1901. This matter was doubtless brought to
a head by pendency of reapportionment measures under the recent census of 1900
but as early as 1895, it was reported that the country members of the legislature
wished to have a constitutional convention called so as to restrict the power of
Cook county in the general assembly. Ibid., January 31, 1895.
13 House Journal, 1903, p. 27.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 197
framers of the constitution of 1870. In order to pass a reso-
lution in the legislature either to call a convention for revising
the constitution or to propose a separate amendment to the
people, a two-thirds vote of the members of each house is re-
quired, so that one-third of the membership of the legislature
can always prevent any constitutional change, even when de-
sired by considerably more than a bare majority of the
legislature and of the people. If the difficulty of securing a
two-thirds vote in the general assembly for calling a conven-
tion has been overcome, it is still necessary for the movement
for a new constitution to jump two hurdles in the form of
popular elections. 14 The first election is the " next general
election" after the resolution has passed the legislature, at
which the question of calling a convention is submitted to the
people; the second election is that held after the adjournment
of the convention for the purpose of ratifying its work. In
both elections, the constitutional proposition, in order to carry,
must receive a majority of all votes cast, not on the proposi-
tion but at the election. In the case of the first election, such
a majority would be more difficult to secure than in the case
of the second election, because, in the former, other matters
would be presented to the voters for their decision which might
distract their attention from the constitutional proposition,
while, in the latter, the proposition would be submitted at a
special election so that a majority of those voting on the propo-
sition would be equivalent to a majority of those voting at
the election.
It is, however, in the case of the adoption of separate
amendments framed and proposed by the general assembly,
that the framers of the constitution of 1870 showed themselves
to be especially conservative and niggardly in respect to the
freedom of amendment. No less than three different obstacles
are placed in the way of constitutional change by this method
any one of which would ordinarily be sufficient to block any
easy or radical revision. The first obstacle is that the amend-
14 Constitution, article xiv, section l.
198 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ment cannot be proposed or submitted to popular vote unless
it has first received the favorable vote of two-thirds of all
members elected to each of the two houses. The second ob-
stacle is that the proposed amendment must be submitted to
popular vote at the next election of members of the general
assembly, and must be ratified by a majority of the electors
voting, not on the proposition, but at the election. The third
obstacle is that "the general assembly shall have no power to
propose amendments to more than one article of this con-
stitution at the same session, nor to the same article oftener
than once in four years." 15
Each of the above obstacles has operated at one time or
another to prevent the adoption of constitutional amendments
the need for which was very widely, felt and keenly realized.
It may be questioned, therefore, whether the constitution is
not unduly restrictive of amendment, so as to prevent greatly
needed changes until the demand for them has become almost
universal. The framers of the constitution of 1870 were so
well satisfied with their handiwork that although they intended
to make the constitution more easily amendable, they appar-
ently anticipated little need for change; and they seem also to
have felt on general principles that a constitution should be
capable of amendment only with extreme difficulty. This view
has also been held by many persons since that time, especially
by members of the legal profession. They have pointed out
that constitutional changes involve the unsettling of judicial
interpretation of the previous constitutional provisions, that
nearly every change in the basic law requires the courts to go
through a long period of judicial construction, and that mean-
while it is better that the constitution be somewhat ill adapted
to the needs of the day than that the meaning of its provisions
be uncertain. Comparison has also been made with the federal
constitution, and it has been argued that since the latter has
been but infrequently amended, therefore the constitution of
Illinois should also be rarely amended, and the extreme re-
15 Constitution, article xiv, section 2.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 199
strictions contained in that instrument against amendment are
valuable aids in preventing hasty and ill-considered change.
It is of course true that the state constitution should not be
lightly and needlessly tinkered with, but the argument by
analogy from the federal constitution appears to be unsound
for two reasons. In the first place the federal constitution is
the supreme law of the land, while that of Illinois is not the
fundamental law of a sovereign government but merely of a
component government, subordinate to the whole. In the
second place the federal constitution consists principally of
broad general principles and the main outlines of a framework
of government, leaving the details to be filled in largely by
legislation, while, on the other hand, the constitution of Illinois
is a comparatively lengthy document, containing much matter
of a statutory character. The more detailed a constitution,
the more liklihood will there be of the need for change and the
more frequently will the need for change arise. 16
The history of proposed and adopted amendments to the
constitution of 1870, as already indicated may be divided into
three periods: the first extending from that date to 1891, the
second from 1891 to 1899, and the third from 1899 to the
present time. The period prior to 1891 was one of the party
ballot, as no official ballot was issued by the state. Under
the law, political parties might, and almost invariably did,
print on their ballots only one side of a proposition for a con-
stitutional amendment. The result was that when the affirma-
tive of such a proposition was printed on the ballots of a given
party, all straight party votes for that party were counted in
favor of the proposed constitutional amendment. Hence,
where one or both of the two leading parties were in favor
of a given amendment, it was comparatively easy to secure,
almost automatically, a fairly large favorable vote upon it.
Under this system, the requirement of the constitution that the
proposed amendment must receive a majority of the votes casr
16 Tolman, "Amendment to Amending Clause," City Club Bulletin, 6:133;
Proceedings of the Illinois Stale Bar Association, 1902, part 2, p. 158.
200 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
at the election did not operate to prevent any proposed amend-
ments from being carried at the election. 17
In 1891 the second period was inaugurated by the passage
of .the official ballot act according to which both the affirmative
and negative of all propositions for constitutional amendment
were printed on the general ballot for all parties after the list
of candidates, and no provision was made for counting straight
party votes in favor of the proposed amendment. 18 During
the period from 1891 to 1899, three proposed amendments
were submitted to popular vote, two of which were for the
purpose of amending the amending clause so as to enable the
general assembly to propose amendments to two or three
articles of the constitution at the same session. All these
proposed amendments were decisively defeated, none of them
receiving a favorable vote equal to one-fifth of the total vote
cast at the election, although two of them received a majority
of the total vote cast on the proposition. The defeat of these
proposed amendments was not due to any real opposition to
them, but rather to the method of submitting them, combined
with the constitutional requirement of a majority of all votes
cast at the election. The propositions were usually printed on
a remote corner of the ballot, u not to be discovered except by
a man with a search warrant." 10 The defeat of the amend-
ments was also doubtless to be accounted for in part by indiffer-
ence on the part of the voters due to the lack of concreteness
of at least two of the proposals and to the lack of any organ-
ized campaign in their favor.
In order to secure a larger vote on proposed constitutional
amendments, the device of printing them on a separate ballot
was advocated. This method was finally adopted by the sep-
arate ballot act, passed by the general assembly in 1899, ac-
cording to which proposed constitutional amendments and
other public measures were to be printed on a separate ballot
17 Gardner, "The Working of the State-Wide Referendum in Illinois"
American Political Science Review, 5:401, 416.
18 Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 301,
19 Chicago Tribune, May 3, 1895.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 201
and handed to the voter at the polls at the same time as the
ballot containing the names of the candidates. 20 Since the
enactment of this law, three proposed constitutional amend-
ments have been submitted to popular vote, in 1904, 1908, and
1916. The first, providing for special legislation for Chicago,
was carried by a substantial majority, after a spirited and well-
organized campaign of education among the voters throughout
the state. The second, authorizing a $20,000,000 issue of
canal bonds, was also carried by about the same majority. The
proposed amendment of 1916, designed to enlarge the powers
of the general assembly over the subject matter of the taxation
of personal property, received a majority of the votes cast at
the election for the legislative candidates, but failed by about
15,000 of receiving the necessary majority of the total vote of
1,343,000 cast at the election. 21 Although in the case of all
these amendments there was considerable publicity and agita-
tion in favor of them, nevertheless it remains true that the
separate ballot aided very considerably in securing large votes
for the amendments. The constitutional requirement of a
majority of all votes cast at the election, however, still remains
as a very considerable handicap upon the adoption of any
amendment.
During the decade since the adoption of the canal bond issue
amendment of 1908, however, the principal difficulty in the
way of amending the constitution has been the restriction that
the general assembly cannot propose amendments to more than
one article of the constitution at the same session. 22 The grow-
ing need for constitutional change has led to the initiation of
numerous movements by voluntary organization, such as the
Citizens Association of Chicago and the Initiative and Refer-
endum League, looking to the amendment of the constitution in
various respects. In December, 1910, representatives of
20 See an editorial in favor of this method in Chicago Tribune, November 8,
1896, June 6, 1897; Laws of Illinois, 1899, p. 151; Hurd's Revised Statute*,
chapter 46, section 303.
21 The canvassing board held that the amendment had been adopted but a
decision of the supreme court held to the contrary.
22 Constitution, article xiv, section 2.
202 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
twenty civic organizations met in Chicago for the purpose of
defining a program for constitutional reform at the approach-
ing session of the general assembly. In addition to the move-
ment for a constitutional convention, four constitutional amend-
ments were proposed at the conference by the different inter-
ests represented as containing the most timely and imperative
reforms. These were the initiative and referendum, abolition
of cumulative voting or minority representation, revision of
the revenue provisions of the constitution to conform with the
recommendations of the state tax commission, and the amend-
ment of the amendment clause so as to eliminate the restriction
upon the submission of amendments to more than one article
of the constitution at the same session. 23 At the session of
1911, the Legislative Voters League enumerated, in addition
to the above, the following needed amendments to the consti-
tution: the short ballot, the recall, home rule for cities, woman
suffrage, and unification of all taxing bodies within the city of
Chicago and other large cities. 24 To this list might be added
various other proposals for constitutional amendment such as
the reorganization of the judiciary, which have been advocated
in different quarters. Each of the leading political parties of
the state has committed itself in its state platforms to one or
more of these proposed amendments.
The more numerous the various proposals for constitu-
tional amendment, and the more insistent the various organiza-
tions became in urging the submission by the general assembly
of the particular amendments in which they were interested, the
more difficult it became to secure action by that body. Since
amendments could be proposed to only one article of the con-
stitution at the same session, it resulted that, at each session,
the conflict between the advocates of amendments to different
articles of the constitution over the question of the priority of
submission resulted invariably in the failure to submit any
amendment until the adoption in 1915 of a joint resolution pro-
23 Chicago Record-Herald, December 8, 1910.
24 Legislative Voters League, Assembly Bulletin, Number 2, 1911.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 203
viding for the submission of the proposed amendment granting
enlarged power to the general assembly over the subject matter
of the taxation of personal property. 25
It was true that, in the case of some of these amendments,
two or more of them might have been submitted by the legis-
lature at the same time. Thus, the proposed amendment for
the initiative and referendum on ordinary legislation and the
proposition to abolish minority representation might have
been submitted simultaneously as both would amend the
same article of the constitution. It has also been held that the
constitutional restriction does not prevent implied amendments
or changes necessarily worked in other articles of the consti-
tution by the express amendment of a particular article of the
constitution. 26 Nevertheless, two of the most prominent pro-
posed amendments, the initiative and referendum proposition 27
and the proposition to amend the amending clause, 28 could not
be submitted at the same session and consequently were, in
effect, mutually antagonistic. Moreover, the adoption of any
thoroughgoing short ballot plan at one time by the method of
constitutional amendment was impossible even in the absence of
any competing amendment, since such a plan would necessarily
operate to amend more than one article of the constitution.
These difficulties in the way of constitutional change through
the separate amendment method seemed to indicate that a con-
stitutional convention was inevitable and indispensable if con-
stitutional revision adequate to the needs of the state were to be
made.
The opposition to a constitutional convention, however,
25 Senate Journal, 1915, p. 1016-1017. 1 a . public policy vote held in 1912,
the proposition to submit an amendment providing for the classification of prop-
erty for purposes of taxation had been approved by a vote of 541,000 to 187,000.
26 City of Chicago v. Reeves, 220 Illinois, 274.
27 In two public policy votes, in 1902 and 1910, the proposal for the initia-
tive and referendum had been approved by a vote of nearly five to one and
three and a half to one respectively, but neither received a majority of all votes
cast at the elections. The revelations of legislative corruption in the election
of William Lorimer to the United States senate in 1909 tended to renew and
increase the interest in the initiative and referendum. Neither of the public
policy votes, however, resulted in action by the general assembly.
28 This proposition was supported by the Chicago Bar Association.
204 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
was strong and well intrenched. It arose from several sources.
In the first place there was a well-defined fear in Chicago
that a convention might result in bringing about a reduc-
tion or limitation of the representation of that city and of Cook
county in the legislature, though downstate leaders for the
most part disclaimed that there was any such intention. More-
over, as has been pointed out, the failure of the legislature to
^>make a reapportionment of legislative representation since
1901 operates as seriously as a limitation of the representation
of Cook county, which is growing in population much more
rapidly than the rest of the state, as any restriction a constitu-
tional convention might be expected to propose. 29 In the sec-
ond place, opposition to a constitutional convention arose in the
general assembly because it was generally recognized that the
constitutional provision for cumulative voting or minority rep-
resentation would stand little chance of being retained in the
constitution by a convention. Within recent years, this pro-
vision has been generally condemned except by the minority
representatives themselves. Nevertheless, the minority repre-
sentatives constitute at least one-third of the membership of
the lower house and the votes of at least some of them must
be secured before the question of calling a constitutional con-
vention could be submitted to popular vote. It was natural
that such minority members should be reluctant to vote for a
proposition which would probably mean their permanent re-
tirement from public life. 30
Opposition to a constitutional convention also arose from
some conservative quarters in which it was feared that a con-
vention would be dominated by the radical element and would
attempt to introduce current fads and novelties in government
and some of the new institutional forms of democracy. But
to this objection the ready answer was that the work of the
convention would have to be submitted to the people for ratifi-
29 Dodd, "A Constitutional Convention," City Club Bulletin, 6:135-137.
30 In 1913 members of the progressive party were strong advocates of
minority representation.
AMENDMENT AND REVISION 205
cation; and, if it proved to be too radical, they would have an
opportunity to reject it. Finally, it was urged by some that, in
the main, the constitution is a wise and beneficent instrument,
needing amendments only in a few relatively unimportant par-
ticulars, and that it was therefore unwise to throw the whole
document into the melting pot of a convention. Furthermore, it
was argued that, in order that the people may pass intelligently
upon the various proposals for constitutional change, it is bet-
ter that such proposals should be submitted to them separately
so that they may give each proposition undivided attention and
scrutiny, rather than that they should be required to pass upon
the merits of a whole new constitution at once. This objec-
tion, it was conceded, however, might be largely overcome if
the convention, following the example of Ohio in 1912, were to
submit the result of its labors in the form of a series of sep-
arate amendments.
Although the objections to a constitutional convention were
numerous and cogent, they began to give way before the grow-
ing strength of public opinion in favor of calling such a body.
This growing strength of public opinion was evidenced by the
almost unanimous approval of the convention proposal by the
press of the state, by the pledges given in favor of a conven-
tion by nominees for seats in the legislature, and by the planks
inserted in the platforms of political parties. 31 A constitu-
tional convention league, fostered by the Citizens Association
of Chicago, was also formed to push the project, having among
its directors and advisory council many of the most prominent
men and women in public life in the state. In the general
assembly it was strongly urged that a convention was the only
method of constitutional change adequate to the exigencies of
the state; and, at all events, a vote in favor of the convention
resolution was not a vote in favor of a convention necessarily,
but merely a vote in favor of letting the people decide whether
31 In 1914 the platforms of the progressive and socialist parties strongly
advocated a constitutional convention, while those of the democratic and repub-
lican parties, though apparently favoring a convention were less emphatic in
their approval.
206 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
or not they wanted a convention; and no man who believed in
democracy could consistently deny them the right to decide this
question for themselves by withholding his favorable vote on
the convention proposal. Governor Lowden, in his biennial
message of 1917, declared emphatically that the time had come
for a new constitution. By others it was pointed out that it
would be decidedly better to have a convention chosen espe-
cially for the business of constitutional revision rather than
to have the constitution amended as a mere incident or
side line of legislative business, and that the work of a conven-
tion would have the more concentrated attention of the voters,
since it may be submitted at a special election and would have
better chance of ratification than a separate amendment, since
it would require merely a majority voting on the proposition. 32
After repeated failures at successive sessions of the general
assembly, these arguments finally prevailed at the session of
1917, when by a two-thirds majority in both houses it was
voted to submit the question of calling a constitutional conven-
tion to the electors of the state at the next general election.
Had this resolution been passed at the session of 1915 before
the judicial election in June of that year, the question of calling
a convention might have been submitted at that election. But
the first general election to be held after the adoption of the
resolution in 1917 is that to be held in November, 1918, and
the question of calling a convention will consequently be voted
upon at that time. 33 In order practically to assure a favorable
vote on calling a convention it has been proposed that an act be
passed similar to one on the statute books of Ohio, providing
that any political party may approve or disapprove the conven-
tion plan at its state convention. When a party has approved
the plan, all straight party votes cast for the candidates of that
party by voters who have not taken the trouble to vote on the
32 Chicago Tribune, January 26, 1914; Chicago Record-Herald, September
21, 1914.
33 Inasmuch as women have as yet no right to vote for constitutional officers
or on questions whose submission is provided for by the constitution, they will
not be qualified to vote on the question of calling a constitutional convention.
207
proposition shall be counted in favor of the convention. A
bill was also introduced in the fiftieth general assembly provid-
ing that the proposition of calling a convention should be
printed in the first column of the official ballot, but the bill
failed to become a law.
The constitution provides that, " If a majority voting at
the election vote for a convention, the general assembly shall,
at the next session, provide for a convention, to consist of
double the number of members of the senate, to be elected in
the same manner, at the same places and in the same dis-
tricts." 34 It is also provided that the qualifications of mem-
bers of the convention shall be the same as those of members of
the senate. It seems to be generally agreed that the require-
ment that the convention delegates shall be elected in the same
manner as senators does not mean that they must be elected at
the same time as senators, and hence the general assembly
may provide that they shall be chosen at a special election. It
has also been held that the general assembly may follow the ex-
ample set by the Ohio legislature in connection with the con-
stitutional convention of 1912 in that state by requiring that
the convention delegates be nominated by petition only, and
that, as in Ohio, they might be elected on a nonpartisan bal-
lot. 35 There appears, however, to be some legal doubt as to
the correctness of the latter proposition, and it has been de-
clared that " it would be highly unsafe for the General Assem-
bly to provide for the nomination and election of delegates by
any other manner than that provided at the same time with
respect to senators." 30
An election of such importance as that for delegates to a
constitutional convention will, in all probability, attract the at-
tention of the voters of the state to such an extent that they will
elect to that body an abler class of men than are usually called
34 Constitution, article xiv, section i.
35 \vhy a Constitutional Convention Is Unavoidable," Citizens Association
of Chicago, Bulletin, number 31, January 24, 1914.
30 Dodd, " Constitutional Convention or Amending Clause ? " Illinois Law
Review, 9: 615.
208 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
to public office. If the elections are held on a nonpartisan
basis, this will be an added inducement to able men to present
themselves as candidates for seats in the convention. Even
though the elections, however, are legally nonpartisan, it will
be difficult to prevent political parties from making nomina-
tions unofficially and from working for the election of their
nominees.
Two suggestions of practical value have been made in re-
gard to the work of a constitutional convention. In the first
place, provision should be made for investigation of possible
questions to come up in the convention before that body meets
in order to facilitate its work. Secondly, judging from the ex-
perience of other states, it seems clear that, in submitting to
popular vote the work of the convention, the risk of carrying
the whole instrument down to defeat should be as far as pos-
sible avoided by submitting many provisions, especially those
of a controversial character, as separate amendments.
X. THE GOVERNOR
THE governor of Illinois is elected by popular vote every
fourth year at the same time and on the same ballot with
members of the general assembly, heads of state executive de-
partments, members of congress, and presidential electors.
The simultaneous election of the governor and members of the
general assembly is justifiable on the ground that the governor
is largely a political officer and the issues involved in his elec-
tion are usually very similar to those connected with the legis-
lative elections. Moreover, this plan tends generally to secure
an executive and a legislature who are politically harmonious.
A new governor, however, has little time to prepare a legisla-
tive program before the legislature meets. The plan of elect-
ing the governor at the same time with members of congress
and presidential electors is not so commendable, for the issues
involved are usually quite different. In their campaign
speeches, candidates for governor frequently allude in glowing
terms to the principles, platform, and candidate for president
of the national party with which they are affiliated and en-
deavor to attach their political fortunes to those of the national
candidates. The tendency of the voters to vote a straight party
ticket renders it easier for the candidate for governor thus to
confuse the issue. But the plan of combining national and state
elections has the advantage of reducing the number and ex-
pense of elections.
A plurality of the votes is sufficient to elect the governor;
and, if two or more candidates have the same and highest
number of votes, the general assembly is empowered, by joint
ballot, to choose one of them for governor. It is also pro-
vided that contested elections for governor shall be decided by
the two houses of the legislature in joint meeting. The consti-
209
210 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tutional qualifications required of the governor are that he shall
have attained the age of thirty years and have been for five
years a citizen of the United States and of the state. 1 In addi-
tion the candidates must, of course, have been nominated in the
primaries. The introduction of the method of nominating
candidates for governor through primary elections has tended
somewhat to increase the number of candidates and increased
the opportunities of independents. Candidates, however, who
have the backing of a party organization and who are able to
spend money liberally still have the advantage under the pri-
mary system. In practice, eligibility for the governorship usu-
ally consists also in the holding of some public office which
brings the candidate prominently to the notice of the people of
the state. Recent governors, for example, have previously to
their election, held such offices as states attorney of Cook
county, mayor of Chicago, and member of congress. Under
the constitution the governor is ineligible to any other office
during the period for which he shall have been elected, but this
is not held to prevent him from serving as ex officio member of
various state boards and commissions. 2 In giving the governor
a four-year term, Illinois has aligned itself with about half of
the states of the union, which believe in allowing the chief
magistrate a long enough term to become reasonably acquainted
with the duties of the office. The governor of Illinois is also
legally eligible to succeed himself for one or more terms and is
frequently renominated for a second term ; but during the last
three decades, only one governor, Deneen, has been reflected.
The term of the governor is stated in the constitution to ex-
tend for four years beginning on the second Monday in Janu-
ary next after his election and until his successor is elected and
qualified. In practice the terms of some governors have been
lengthened and that of others correspondingly shortened on ac-
count of a deadlock in the organization of the legislature,
1 Constitution, article V, section 4, 5; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46,
section 94.
2 Thus the governor is president of the board of commissioners for the man-
agement of the state library. Ibid., chapter 128, section i.
Vote for Governor,
November 5, 1912
D Democratic
plurality
C3 Democratic
I I majority
p?S| Progressive
Q* plurality
Republican plurality
4( Republican majority
9 Progressive majority
(Minor parties disregarded)
THE GOVERNOR 211
through a prolonged contest over the election of a speaker of
the house. Until the speaker is chosen the new governor can-
not be declared elected nor inaugurated, and meanwhile the
preceding governor continues to hold office. In 1913 Gover-
nor Dunne was not inaugurated until three weeks after the date
specified in the constitution for the beginning of the governor's
term. 3
The plan adopted in the constitution of 1848 of assigning
the governor a salary, the amount of which was fixed in that
document, was abandoned in 1870; and the exact amount of the
governor's compensation is now determined by legislative en-
actment, subject to the requirement that it shall not be in-
creased nor diminished during his term of office. The amount
as now fixed is $12,000 per annum which is greater than that
paid the governor of any other state, but is considerably less
than that paid the mayor of Chicago and is the same as that
received by the states attorney and the circuit and superior
court judges of Cook county. The governor is also granted
the use of the executive mansion and has a contingent fund for
unforeseen needs placed at his disposal.
The office of governor may become vacant by his resigna-
tion, absence from the state, conviction on impeachment, or
other disability. Under these circumstances the lieutenant gov-
ernor succeeds to the powers, duties, and emoluments of the
office for the remainder of the term or until the disability is
removed. 4 No case of impeachment of the governor has yet
occured in Illinois, and the office has very seldom been vacated
through any cause.
The powers, duties, and functions of the governor may be
classified into legislative or political, administrative, and spe-
cial. Among his powers in relation to the legislature is that
of issuing writs of election to fill vacancies occuring in the gen-
eral assembly. Members of the latter body desiring to resign
should, consequently, present their resignations to the gover-
3 Constitution, article v, section i; Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p.
1237-1240.
4 Constitution, article V, section 17.
212 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
nor. The writ of election is issued to the county clerk of the
county in which the member resided, and the time fixed is that
of the next general election, unless a special election is neces-
sary to fill the vacancy. 5
Over the organization of the legislature the governor has
no legal power of control. The governor may, however, and
sometimes has exerted his personal influence to secure an organ-
ization of the legislature which will be in the interest of his
legislative program. This is particularly apt to be the case
where the governor is considered to be the political leader of
his party. A governor who takes a hand in the organization
of the legislature runs the risk of being accused of undue inter-
ference and usurpation, and this has doubtless deterred some
governors from doing so. Governor Lowden announced pub-
licly that he would keep hands off the organization of the legis-
lature. Governor Yates maintained neutrality in regard to the
selection of the speaker of the house, but took a hand in organ-
izing the senate in the interests of party harmony. In 1908
Governor Deneen exerted his influence in the organization of
the senate and in preventing the reelection of Speaker Shurtleff
in the forty-sixth general assembly. 6
The governor is authorized by the constitution to adjourn
or prorogue the general assembly in case of disagreement be-
tween the two houses with respect to the time of adjournment.
Before acting, the governor must first be notified of such dis-
agreement by the house first moving the adjournment, and then
he may adjourn the legislature to such time as he sees fit, but
not, of course, beyond the first day of the next regular session.
The power of the governor, upon receiving the properly au-
thenticated notification of disagreement, is a discretionary poli-
tical power, not subject to judicial review. 7 Only twice, in
5 Report of the Attorney-General, 1910, p. 507-508, 1913, p. 99-100; Hurd's
Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 129.
6 Chicago Herald, November n, 1916; Chicago Tribune, January 8, 1901,
November n, 27, 1908.
7 Constitution, article V, section 9; People v. Hatch, 33 Illinois, 9; Debates
and Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention, 1870, 1:776; Report of the
Attorney-General, 1912, p. 73-83.
THE GOVERNOR 213
1863 and 1911, does it appear that the governor has had occa-
sion to exercise this power.
The governor is authorized by statute, when it is neces-
sary in consequence of pestilence or public danger, to convene
the legislature in a place other than the seat of government at
Springfield, 8 a power of little moment on account of the infre-
quency of occasions for using it. The governor has, however,
the important power of convening the legislature in special
session on extraordinary occasions. He does so by issuing a
proclamation, in which he states the purposes for which they
are convened, and the general assembly is prohibited from
entering upon any legislative business other than that men-
tioned in the governor's call. 9 This naturally gives the gov-
ernor much larger control over a special than over a regular
session. Even in a special session, however, the governor
merely designates the general subjects of legislation, and the
detailed means of providing for such subjects remain in the dis-
cretion of the legislature. Moreover, after the governor has"
issued his proclamation and the assembly has convened, he can-
not broaden the field of legislation at the special session by
sending a message urging additional legislation. This can.
only be done by a proclamation calling another special session
and specifying therein the additional matters to be considered.
Two special sessions may overlap or exist concurrently. In
March, 1912, Governor Deneen issued a proclamation calling
a special session and enumerating certain subjects for legisla-
tive consideration. Subsequently, while this session was still
in existence, other matters came up requiring legislative action;
and the governor thereupon called another special session for
their consideration, so that there were two simultaneous spe-
cial sessions. 10 The calling of a second simultaneous special
8 Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 63, section i, chapter 123, section i.
* Constitution, article V, section 8. The general assembly may, however,
ratify an amendment to the constitution of the United States in special session,
even though not included in the governor's call. Report of the Attorney-Gen-
eral, 1912, p. 83-87.
10 Ibid., 964-966. It was not necessary to keep a separate journal for each
special session, and for practical purposes, they constituted but one session.
2i 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
session involves the useless expense of mileage for the members
and other perquisites received by them for each session. In
order to avoid this difficulty and the practical evasion of the
constitution, that instrument should be amended so as to read
that, during special sessions, the general assembly shall enter
upon no business except such as the governor may designate,
whether submitted by him before or during the session.
Popular control over legislation is increased through the
governor's control of the topics to be considered in special ses-
sion. Such sessions have been somewhat frequent during re-
cent years. Where the governor, however, includes in his call
a large number of matters for legislative consideration, many
of them of no immediate urgency, as has sometimes happened,
his control is weakened, because his fire is scattered. Governor
Deneen issued a call for a special session in 1909 enumerating
twenty-four matters for legislative consideration, while Gover-
nor Dunne, in his call of 1915 included nineteen separate
matters.
No provision is contained in the constitution authorizing
the governor to call the senate alone into special session, but,
as the business to be transacted in such session might at times
be attended to by the senate alone, it would seem that this
power should be specifically granted to the governor.
The governor is made an important part of the lawmaking
authority through his power to send messages and recommen-
dations to the general assembly, and through his power to ap-
prove and veto its acts. It is his duty, both at the beginning of
each session and also at the end of his term of office, to give
the general assembly information, by message, of the condition
of the state, and to recommend such measures as he deems ex-
pedient. He is also required to accompany his message with a
statement of all moneys received and paid out by him, together
with an estimate of the amount of money required to be raised
by taxation for all purposes. 11 The latter requirement, how-
ever, has seldom or never been complied with. If fully utilized
11 Constitution, article v, section 7.
THE GOVERNOR 215
this provision might enable the governor to inaugurate a plan
resembling to some degree an executive budget system. For
the promotion of such a plan, however, the constitutional pro-
vision should be broadened so as to provide for the submission
by the governor of a statement both of estimated revenues and
of estimated appropriations. Under an act of 1913 the gov-
ernor was made a member of a joint legislative reference
bureau, one of whose duties is to cause to be compiled a de-
tailed statement of the estimated appropriations required by
the several departments of the state government for the next
biennium. No provision, however, was made in the act for a
statement of the estimated revenues. 12 By the consolidation
act of 1917, the governor is required, within a month after the
organization of the general assembly to submit a state budget,
containing the amounts recommended by him to be appropri-
ated to the respective departments and institutions and for all
other public purposes, the estimated revenues from taxation
and from other sources, and an estimate of the amount required
to be raised by taxation. Thus the budget, when it reaches the
general assembly, has the official support and authority of the
governor behind it, though legal control over the appropriation
and revenue acts still remains largely with the legislature, sub-
ject to the power of the governor to veto appropriation items.
Under the system of local representation in the legislature, that
body is under no adequate sense of responsibility to the state at
large in making appropriations. The financial budget, there-
fore, including all contemplated items of appropriation, should
originate from and be initiated by the governor, as the respon-
sible head of the state government, subject to the power of the
general assembly to criticize the proposals and to reduce the
amounts. 13
Every bill which has passed the two branches of the general
assembly must, before it becomes a law, be submitted to the
governor for his approval or disapproval. The governor is
12 Laws of 1913, p. 392.
13 Proposed Legislative Measures to Carry into Effect the Recommendations
of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 61.
2i6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
allowed a period of ten days exclusive of Sundays, in which to
consider what action he shall take upon the bill. If he fails
to take action upon it within this period, it becomes a law with-
out his signature. If the general assembly adjourns prior to
the expiration of the ten-day period, the bill becomes a law un-
less, within ten days after such adjournment, the bill is filed,
with the governor's objections, in the office of the secretary of
state. 14 In practice, the general assembly usually passes many
important measures during the last few days of the session,
and in consequence a great mass of legislative business is left
over for the governor to act upon. During recent sessions, the
general assembly has adopted the practice of holding a short
adjourned session at the expiration of the ten-day period al-
lowed the governor in order to consider his veto messages. In
order that the governor may give adequate consideration to the
mass of bills enacted near the close of the legislative session,
the ten-day period should be lengthened. Even with the ten-
day period, the governor is usually swamped by the mass of
bills dumped upon him during the last few days of the session,
so that he is barely able to consider them thoroughly, even
though he toils night and day. Over three hundred bills were
sent to Governor Dunne during the dying days of the forty-
ninth general assembly. The governor, however, has the
assistance of the attorney-general, who gives him opinions on
the constitutionality of measures submitted to him.
In order to increase the potency of the governor's veto
power, he is given by a constitutional amendment of 1884, the
power to veto separate items or sections of appropriation bills.
This enables him to veto such items of expenditure as he deems
to be unnecessary or unwise and to eliminate " riders " or ex-
traneous matter attached to appropriation bills. Although this
object cannot be effected by the governor's veto power in the
case of other than appropriation bills, something approaching
the same result may be reached through the operation of the
14 Constitution, article v, section 16. There is thus, strictly speaking, no
such thing as a " pocket veto " in Illinois.
THE GOVERNOR 217
constitutional provision that no act shall embrace more than
one subject. 15 Recent governors have used the power to veto
items unsparingly and as a result hundreds of thousands of dol-
lars have been saved to the state. The method of appropriat-
ing public funds in the general assembly is such that that body
sometimes appropriates such large amounts as to indicate that
no adequate attention has been paid to what the aggregate of
all appropriations will be, nor to whether the condition of the
state finances can stand the strain. It thus devolves upon the
governor to slice off the unnecessary items. This he can only
do by vetoing the least unobjectionable items, which might well
be allowed to stand if there were any other way of trimming
the total sum. The financial significance of the governor's veto
power is indicated by the fact that in 1903 Governor Yates
found it necessary to trim more than $1,000,000 from the
total appropriations; and in 1915 Governor Dunne vetoed
appropriations aggregating more than $2,000,000.
The control of the governor over appropriations is some-
times impeded by the skill of the framers of the appropriation
bills in so intertwining the various items of a bill as to pre-
vent the governor from vetoing an item without defeating the
whole object of the bill. Furthermore, even when an item is
easily separable from the rest of the bill, the governor cannot
veto it without running the imminent risk of incurring the
severe displeasure of the person, interest, or institution which
would benefit from the contemplated expenditure. More seri-
ous still, he may by vetoing a particular item so offend the mem-
ber or members of the general assembly who are interested in
securing the passage of such item as entirely to alienate them
from the support of his own legislative program. In cutting
down appropriations, therefore, the governor must be imbued
with a high order of courage and a deep belief in the support
of his action by the mass of the people.
15 Constitution, article iv, section 13. The provision of article iv, section
16, that "bills making appropriations . . . for the salaries of the officers
of the government shall contain no provision on any other subject" also prevents
flagrant " riders " in state general appropriation bills.
218 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The control of the governor over state finances would be
much increased, if he had the power not only to veto items but
also to reduce items in the appropriation bills. Impelled by
the desire to keep the total appropriations within the amount of
the estimated revenues of the state, Governor Dunne, by veto-
ing parts of items in the omnibus appropriation bill passed by
the legislature of 1915, sliced more than half a million dollars
from the aggregate amount. The question of the governor's
power thus to reduce items, however, having been carried into
the courts, it was held by the supreme court that " the power
given to the governor by the constitution to disapprove of and
to veto any distinct item or section in an appropriation bill does
not give him the power to disapprove of a part of a distinct
item and approve the remainder, and if he vetoes part of an
item by striking out the words ' per annum ' or by approving a
part of the amount of one item and disapproving the remain-
der, his action is void and the whole item remains in force as
passed by the legislature." 16 Legally, however, it is doubtless
true that the governor could effect a reduction in the total ap-
propriations by refusing to approve vouchers for expenditures
beyond a certain amount. It has been held by the attorney-
general that the exercise by the governor of his power to ap-
prove or disapprove vouchers for the expenditure of public
funds is a discretionary act, and, consequently, cannot be com-
pelled by mandamus. 17
In order that the legislature may be informed of the gov-
ernor's reasons for vetoing a bill, as well as to prevent the
arbitrary exercise of the power, the governor is required, when
exercising his power of veto, to state his objections to the bill.
In order that these objections may receive proper considera-
tion by the general assembly, it is required that these objections
shall be entered at large, upon the journal of each house. The
general assembly has the power of repassing the bill over the
governor's veto, but only by an extraordinary majority vote,
19 Fergus <v. Russel, 270 Illinois, 304.
17 Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. 1038-1039.
THE GOVERNOR 219
namely, two-thirds of all members elected to each house. In
order that the members of the general assembly shall act under
a due sense of responsibility, it is further required that the vote
on repassage over the governor's veto shall be determined by
yeas and nays and be entered upon the journal. 18 A recent
study of the veto power of the governor of Illinois reaches
the following conclusions :
I. Contrary to the older conception of the function of the
veto power, it has rarely been used to protect the executive and
the judicial departments against encroachments on the part
of the legislature.
II. On the other hand, it has frequently been invoked to
prevent unconstitutional use of the legislative power in other
respects.
III. Considerable defective legislation has been prevented
. . . . thereby saving the people of the state much incon-
venience and expense.
IV. Most important, however, has been the use of the
veto power to enable the governor to participate in the de-
termination of state policy:
1. Considerably more than half of the vetoes from 1818
to 1915 were made on grounds of policy or expediency.
2. While many of the bills disapproved were of very
great importance, no serious abuse of the veto power has ever
occurred.
3. On the other hand, many of the lines of policy sug-
gested by early vetoes found adoption in the constitution
of 1870.
4. The disapproval of items in appropriation bills has
been closely related to the growing expenditures of the state,
though it has not been sufficient to prevent enormous in-
creases in late years. 19
Although the veto power has been an important influence
in improving the quality of the legislative output, the influence
18 Constitution, article v, section 16.
19 These conclusions were reached by Dr. Niels H. Debel in his doctoral
thesis, Veto Power of the Governor of Illinois.
220 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
which it exerts is largely of a negative character. Some posi-
tive influence may be exerted by the existence of the veto power
when it is known by the legislature that unless certain pro-
visions are inserted in a bill, it will not receive the governor's
approval; or after a bill has been vetoed, it may be amended so
as to meet the governor's views. In the main, however, the
governor has no legal power of exercising positive control over
legislation except such as may be derived from his power of
sending messages and recommendations to the legislature. In
practice, however, the governor is not confined to the powers
legally conferred upon him, but may bring his personal influ-
ence to bear in various ways in promoting a given program of
legislation. Some governors have considered their principal
achievements to lie in the field of important legislation secured
rather than in that of administrative results. Thus, Governor
Deneen, during his campaign for reelection in 1912, made
numerous speeches in which he appealed for the suffrage of
the voters on the ground of the important and beneficial laws
enacted during his administration. Governor Lowden, even
before his inauguration, announced his intention of having
certain important measures presented for legislative considera-
tion and used his personal influence vigorously in conference
with committees of the general assembly and with other influ-
ential individuals in pushing such measures to enactment. When
the governor and the legislature are in political harmony and
the governor is looked upon as the leader of his party in the
state, his personal influence in determining the important fea-
tures of the legislative output is naturally accentuated.
It should be noted that the practice of political parties in
drawing up their platforms after the candidates for governor
have been nominated tends to give greater influence and con-
trol to the governor, when elected, over the legislative pro-
gram of the party. The practice of nominating candidates for
governor by the direct primary method also tends to in-
crease the prestige and the influence of the governor as the
leader of his party.
221
The passage of the consolidation bill by the general assem-
bly in 1917 was undoubtedly due in a large measure to the
vigorous advocacy of the bill by Governor Lowden and to his
political sagacity in refusing to make appointments to office
until the bill had been passed. Even before the fiftieth general
assembly met twenty-four members of the state senate had
signed an agreement to support the important features of the
Lowden legislative program. 20 The actual terms of the con-
solidation bill were drafted under the supervision of the gov-
ernor, and, during its consideration in the legislature, it was
commonly known as the " Lowden bill." The governor was
thus exerting a real and very positive influence in legislation,
yet he was not accused of undue interference or usurpation.
This was partly due perhaps to the political harmony between
the executive and the legislature, yet there has undoubtedly
been within recent years a change in public opinion which is
reflected in the attitude of the legislature, so that the gover-
nor's positive influence in legislation is no longer looked upon
as usurpation but as both legitimate and desirable. This tends
to render the governor's legislative power commensurate with
his responsibility. The older attitude is illustrated by the re-
marks of Mr. Washburn in the constitutional convention of
1870: "The legislative power," he declared, "the power
to inaugurate and mature the policy of the State belongs exclu-
sively to the General Assembly." " It would be a usurpation
by the governor to exercise that power." "The duty of the
governor is to execute the policy, not to say what the policy
shall be." 21 In the forty-third general assembly, Governor
Yates was severely criticized for executive interference in leg-
islation. 22 His own attitude toward such a charge was indi-
cated in the following words from his message to the legisla-
ture: "Executive interference,' a term contemptuously em-
ployed by persons and interests whose conception of the execu-
20 Chicago Tribune, December 27, 1916.
^Debates and Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention, 1870, 1:759.
Italics are the author's.
22 Chicago Tribune, February 6, 1903.
222 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tive office is that the governor should exhaust his entire time in
signing papers, and acting as a mere figurehead, and by persons
or interests whose design is to intimidate a governor into inac-
tivity, (while they themselves 'interfere' constantly, for their
own advantage)." 23
Under existing conditions the governor is practically
obliged to take a hand in legislation, if he is to exercise any
control over the administration, inasmuch as the latter is
largely subject to legislative direction rather than to executive
order. The positive influence of the governor in legislation
was recognized and given some official standing by a rule of the
house of representatives, adopted in 1913, providing that a bill
or resolution introduced to carry out a recommendation of the
governor may, by executive message addressed to the speaker,
be made an administration measure. When such a measure
has been reported out of committee, it has precedence over all
other bills except appropriation bills. 24 This rule was " in-
tended to give assurance to the governor that measures which
he recommends will be given fair consideration and by such
assurance to impose upon him the obligation to have a legis-
lative program." 25 This rule has probably not been as fruit-
ful of results as was expected and has now been dropped from
the rules of the house, but it is a step in the right direction.
Among important administration measures which have passed
the legislature was the fish and game conservation act of 1913.
The rule should be revived and carried further by giving the
governor, either in person or by representative, the power to
appear before a committee of the whole house or a joint com-
mittee of the general assembly, and advocate and defend in
public meeting the administration measures, instead of having
to summon to private conferences members whose support he
desires, as he is practically forced to do under the present
system.
The strength of the governor's position in urging his legis-
28 Senate Journal, 1903, p. 9.
24 House Journal, 1913, p. 315-316.
25 Hull, "Legislative Procedure," American Political Science Review, 7:239.
THE GOVERNOR 223
lative measures is, of course, largely enhanced if he is able to
secure widespread popular support for his program. His suc-
cess is largely determined by his ability to take the people into
his confidence, to enlist the support of influential leaders within
and without the legislature, and to bring full publicity to bear
throughout the whole course of legislation. A governor is usu-
ally more influential in legislation during the first session of his
term. One means whereby public attention could be forcefully
called to the governor's legislative recommendations is indi-
cated by the success of President Wilson in addressing con-
gress in person. The governors of Illinois, however, have not
seen fit to depart from the customary rule of sending written
messages to the legislature. On a few special occasions, how-
ever, the governor of Illinois has addressed the legislature in
person. This was done by Governor Dunne in 1916, and in
the following year Governor Lowden appeared before a joint
session of the general assembly and addressed them in regard
to the support to be given by Illinois to our government at
Washington in the crisis produced by the breaking off of rela-
tions with Germany. 26
The powers of the governor in relation to the officers of
the administration are subject to serious limitations. The con-
stitution vests in the governor the "supreme executive power,"
which implies that subordinate executive powers are vested in
other officers. This is in fact the case, for, as stated in another
section of the constitution, the " executive department shall
consist of a governor, lieutenant-governor, secretary of state,
auditor of public accounts, treasurer, superintendent of public
instruction and attorney-general." The real content of the
governor's administrative power, however, is determined, not
by these provisions, but by the provisions of the constitution
and statutes conferring specific powers upon him. This is true
also of the provision of the constitution which confers upon the
governor the power and duty of taking "care that the laws be
20 Chicago Herald, May n, 1916, February 7, 1917. Governor Lowden also
appeared in person and addressed a joint session of the legislature at the close
of the fiftieth general assembly and at other times. Ibid., June 18, 1917.
224 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
faithfully executed." 27 This provision merely vests in the gov-
ernor a rather vague and general power of supervision over
other state and local officers in whose hands the direct execu-
tion of the laws is placed. It is of relatively little importance
except in so far as it is supplemented by other more specific
constitutional or statutory grants of power. Thus, under the
statutes the governor may offer a reward for the apprehension
of a person accused or convicted of certain crimes. 28 Aside
from any question of legal power, the governor may exert his
personal influence and bring pressure to bear upon officials by
means of publicity and in other ways in order to secure the
enforcement of the laws. Thus, when race riots broke out in
Springfield in 1908 Governor Deneen summoned the states
attorney of Sangamon county before him and ordered that a
special grand jury be convened immediately to indict the pris-
oners in the county jail. He also informed the city authorities
that the ensuing prosecutions must be real and vigorous. 29
An important specific administrative power of the governor
is that of making appointments to office. Under the constitu-
tion he is authorized to appoint, with the consent of the senate,
all officers whose offices are established by the constitution or
by law and whose selection is not otherwise provided for.
Many statutes have been passed in recent years creating new
state officers, and in most cases their appointment has been
vested in the governor and senate. The total number of offi-
cers whom the governor now has the power to appoint during
his term reaches into the hundreds. Most of these are state
administrative officers, such as members of various state boards
and commissions. His power of appointing local officers is
very slight. Previously to the establishment of the municipal
court in Chicago by an act of 1905 as amended in 1907, the
governor appointed justices of the peace for that city with
the consent of the senate and upon the recommendation of
2T Article v, section 6.
28 Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 60, section 12; Report and Opinions of
the Attorney-General, 1914, p. 160-161.
28 Chicago Tribune, August 17, 1908.
THE GOVERNOR 225
a majority of the judges of the circuit, superior, and county
courts. 30
Beginning immediately after his election and extending
well into his term, a governor-elect or new governor is usually
besieged by a horde of office seekers. Within two weeks after
his election Governor-elect Tanner had received over three
thousand letters applying for positions, and swarms of office
seekers were standing in line all day to see him. 31 This con-
dition is especially apt to be produced when there has been a
change of party as well as a change or impending change of
administration. A governor of the spoilsman type may wel-
come such a situation as it enables him to build up a political
machine. It is probable, however, that few governors really
relish the duty of making wholesale appointments to hundreds
of state positions, many of which are useless and a needless
expense to the state. Even were all needless positions lopped
off, there would still be many minor offices which might well be
left to be filled by the governor's subordinates, leaving him
free to devote his attention only to the important appointments
and to his legislative program.
The governor's appointive power does not extend to the
heads of executive departments established by the constitution,
such as the secretary of state and attorney-general, who are
chosen by popular vote. This method tends to make these offi-
cers independent of the governor and thus to disintegrate the
administration. The disintegration of the administration has
been further increased by the practice of the legislature in con-
ferring, by statute, administrative powers on the constitutional
state officers, other than the governor, and especially by the
legislative practice of continually creating new boards, commis-
sions, and administrative agencies. The fact, however, that the
governor and the heads of executive departments are elected at
the same time and on the same ticket brings it about that they
almost invariably belong to the same political party, though
30 Constitution, article V, section 10, article VI, section 28.
31 Chicago Tribune, November 25, 1896.
226 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
sometimes to different factions of the same party. While the
wishes of the candidate to be nominated for governor may be
consulted as to who shall be his running mates for the other
principal offices on the same ticket, it is nevertheless true that
legally the governor has no control over the choice of the heads
of departments; and he cannot, therefore, be said to have a
cabinet in the sense in which this term is used in the national
government. As a result of his four years' experience, Gov-
ernor Dunne advocated the introduction of such a cabinet sys-
tem in the state government of Illinois. "The responsibility
for the passage of certain laws," he is quoted as saying, "as
well as administrative responsibility is in the public mind
thrown upon the executive and where responsibility rests there
should be power to act. Power to act and accomplish, how-
ever, cannot be where different departments of the administra-
tion are made independent of each other by popular election.
There is a loud cry in these modern times for a short ballot,
and a short ballot can be attained by centralizing authority and
throwing the responsibility of efficiency upon the executive by
giving him the appointing power. If the governor had the ap-
pointment of such officers he could make them, by virtue of his
appointment, members of his cabinet, just as the President
appoints his cabinet, and there then would be complete har-
mony between the different departments of the state." 32 It
was one of the objects of the recommendations of the efficiency
and economy committee to provide for the creation of a cab-
inet or advisory council around the governor; and this object
has been, to some extent, attained by the passage of the con-
solidation act of 1917.
Although the governor cannot make original appointments
to the positions of elective heads of departments, he is author-
ized to fill vacancies occurring in them. In the case of vacan-
cies occurring during the recess of the senate, in offices which
are not elective, the governor is authorized to make temporary
appointments until the next meeting of the senate, at which the
32 Chicago Herald, January 2, 1917.
THE GOVERNOR 227
person nominated by the governor must be confirmed if he is
to continue in the office during the remainder of the term. 33
Although the governor had prior to 1917 a large power of
appointment to membership on various state boards and com-
missions, the exercise of this power is subjected to certain prac-
tical restrictions. No attempt is made to coordinate the length
of the terms of the members of such boards with that of the
governor; and, in the case of large boards, whose members
serve for long terms the governor may not, during his term of
office, have an opportunity of appointing a majority of the
members. The supreme court has held that, under the consti-
tution, there may be two modes of appointment to office by the
governor one by and with the advice and consent of the
senate, and the other by the sole and independent act of the
governor, without the consent of the senate; and it is therefore
competent for the legislature by law, to create an office, and
provide for the appointment of the officer without the assent
of the senate. 34 This has been done in the case of a few offi-
cers, as, for example, the members of the former state board
of dental examiners, the printer expert, the adjutant general
and other officers in the militia, where the power of appoint-
ment rests in the governor alone. But, in the large majority
of cases, the power of the governor to appoint is limited by the
necessity of securing the confirmation of a majority of all
elected members of the senate. This device divides the re-
sponsibility for the appointment between the governor and the
senate and may sometimes result in virtually compelling the
governor to sacrifice his legislative program in order to main-
tain a high standard in appointments, or else to sacrifice his de-
sires with respect to appointments in order to secure the pas-
sage of bills in which he is interested. On the other hand, the
governor may not always be well informed as to the best men
to appoint to office, and the advice of the senate may some-
times be of material assistance to him in selecting such men. It
33 Constitution, article v, sections n and 20.
34 Wilcox <v. People, 90 Illinois, 186.
228 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
might be better to require that the governor should secure and
avail himself of the advice of the senate, but not to require
him to act upon it, so that the whole responsibility for the final
decision may rest upon his shoulders.
Any power of supervision over state boards and commis-
sions which the governor's power of appointing their members
enabled him to exercise has been seriously impeded by the multi-
plicity and lack of systematic organization of such agencies.
This difficulty, however, has been in large degree remedied by
the consolidation act of 1917, organizing most of the agencies
into nine executive departments, each under a director ap-
pointed by the governor and senate for four-year terms, sub-
ject to the power of the governor to remove them for cause.
Some of these directors take places previously occupied by
boards, and the power of the governor is consequently in-
creased because his power of appointment is no longer subject
to the virtual limitation which the rule of gradual renewal of
the membership of boards entails. Some administrative and
advisory boards are retained in the consolidation act, but the
governor's power over them is increased by the absence of any
requirement for minority representation on them.
The power of appointment, in and by itself, confers upon
the governor no legal power of control over his appointees
after they have assumed office. This difficulty, however, is to
some extent overcome by provisions conferring upon the gov-
ernor some power of suspension in office and of removal from
office. Thus the officers of the executive departments and of
all the public institutions of the state are required to make
regular biennial reports to the governor to be transmitted by
him to the general assembly. Such officers are also required to
make to the governor a semiannual report of all moneys re-
ceived and disbursed by them. Furthermore, the governor
may at any time require from such officers information, in
writing and under oath, upon any subject relating to their
duties. 35 Thus, shortly after his inauguration, Governor Low-
86 Constitution, article v, sections 20, 21.
THE GOVERNOR 229
den sent a letter to each of the numerous commissions, bureaus,
and departments asking for information as to the funds avail-
able and the expenditures to be made until the end of the fiscal
year. 36 In case any such reports should disclose an unsatisfac-
tory condition in the management of a particular office, the
governor may attempt to remedy such condition either by
admonition and advice to the delinquent officer, or by bringing
the full light of publicity to bear upon the facts. An officer
who makes a false report of his receipts and disbursements is
declared to be guilty of perjury and subject to appropriate
penalties.
Aside from his legal powers, the governor may by his per-
sonal influence exercise some supervision over the state depart-
ments and institutions. Thus, Governor Deneen in 1905 in-
structed officials of state institutions that the payrolls must be
gone over carefully and the pruning knife used so as to reduce
expenses and to weed out incompetents and employees whose
services in the institutions were not actually required. In the
following year, the governor took a personal hand in directing
the activities of the state food commission, and by his direct
orders the state analyst made a tour for the purpose of study-
ing the pure food laws in operation in other states. 37 In the
case, however, of the constitutional elective state officers, the
power of the governor to require reports is, in practice, of little
value in enabling him to supervise them in the performance of
their duties. They are practically equal to, and independent
of, the governor, and the necessity under which he rests of re-
maining on terms of amity with them would ordinarily prevent
him from requiring from them any reports other than those
which they voluntarily submit.
Finally, in order to improve the conduct of administrative
offices, the governor may remove any officer subject to appoint-
ment by him for certain specified causes, viz., incompetency,
neglect of duty, or malfeasance in office. 38 This provision rep-
36 Chicago Tribune, January n, 1917.
87 Ibid., March 23, 1905, March 16, 1906.
88 Constitution, article V, section 12.
2 3 o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
resents an honest effort on the part of the constitutional con-
vention to render the power of the governor to some extent
commensurate with his responsibility and probably has a more
important influence than any other single provision toward
making the governor the real, instead of merely the nominal,
head of the administration. Under the existing method of
selecting the heads of the state executive departments and the
system of decentralized enforcement of state law, however, the
governor cannot fully assume the position of real head of the
administration by virtue of his power of removing his ap-
pointees. This provision of the constitution should therefore
be strengthened at least to the extent of giving the governor
power to remove any state executive officer, whether elective or
appointive.
The fact, however, that the constitution confers upon the
governor the power of removing such officers as he may ap-
point does not absolutely exclude him from the power of re-
moving elective officers, provided the latter power is specifically
conferred upon him by the legislature. Thus, by an act of
1905, the power was conferred upon the governor to declare,
by proclamation, the office of any sheriff to be vacant when-
ever a prisoner is taken from his custody and lynched. 39 In
1909 a mob lynched a prisoner which it had taken from the
sheriff of Alexander county. In accordance with the statute,
the governor issued his proclamation declaring the office vacant.
Under the statute the governor might reinstate the sheriff if
the latter could show that he had done all in his power to
protect his prisoner. In this case, however, the sheriff was
unable to show this to the satisfaction of the governor, who
accordingly sent a notice of the vacancy to the county board,
who thereupon appointed a successor. The deposed sheriff
contested the legality of the governor's action, but, when the
case was carried to the supreme court, the latter upheld the
constitutionality of the statute and the validity of the gover-
nor's action under it. 40 It is to be noted, however, that the gov-
39 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 38, section 2s6x.
40 People v. Nellis, 249 Illinois, 12.
THE GOVERNOR 231
ernor's power of removing the sheriff is narrowly limited so
that it can be exercised only under circumstances which seldom
arise.
The constitutional power of the governor to remove his
appointees is as above indicated, apparently limited to those
cases, where such appointees are guilty of " incompetency, neg-
lect of duty or malfeasance in office." The constitution, how-
ever, provides no method whereby the governor shall deter-
mine the existence of the specified causes of removal, nor does
it declare whether the governor's action in removing an officer
shall be final and conclusive or subject to judicial review.
These points, however, have been cleared up by the supreme
court. The governor undertook to remove the West Chicago
park commissioners and to appoint their successors without
bringing any charges against the incumbents or giving them a
hearing. The supreme court held that the governor's power
of removal applied both to officers who were appointed by the
governor with the approval of the senate and also to officers,
such as the park commissioners, who were appointed by the
governor alone. The court also held that, when exercising his
power of removal, the governor may adopt such method of
ascertaining the existence of the specified causes of removal
as he sees fit, and consequently no written charges or formal
trial are required by law. Moreover, the court held that the
governor's action is final and not subject to review by the
courts. 41 Although the governor is not, therefore, compelled
to give a hearing to the officers whose removal he contemplates,
he nevertheless may, and sometimes does, as a matter of cour-
tesy, accord it.
Among the special functions which the governor performs
is that of acting as commander-in-chief of the military and
naval forces of the state, except when they are called into the
service of the United States. In exercising this power the gov-
ernor ordinarily acts through the adjutant general, who is ap-
pointed by him. Although appointed by the governor, the ad-
41 Wilcox v. People, 90 Illinois, 186.
232 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
jutant general is not subject to removal by him, but only by
court-martial. The governor may, by proclamation, require
the enrollment of the unorganized, or reserve, militia. 42 The
purposes for which the militia may be called out are specified
in the constitution, viz., " to execute the laws, suppress insur-
rection and repel invasion." These phrases are sufficiently
broad to cover practically every sort of emergency which might
necessitate the use of the militia. Whether the occasion re-
quires the calling out of the militia is a question of which the
governor is practically the sole judge, and he may act entirely
on his own initiative and responsibility. In practice, however,
he usually waits until he receives a request for assistance from
the sheriff, states attorney, mayor, or other law-enforcing
officer. The most frequent use of the militia has been to dis-
perse mobs which are attempting to take the law into their own
hands, and, within recent years, to maintain order during dis-
turbance incident to strikes and lockouts. In the administra-
tions of both Governors Deneen and Dunne, an urgent public
demand arose that the governor should call out the militia to
enforce the Sunday closing statute, which was notoriously dis-
regarded in certain cities. The attorney-general in both ad-
ministrations, however, held that no such duty rested upon the
governor, but that the responsibility rested upon the local offi-
cers, who, if derelict, should be removed in the manner pro-
vided by law. 43
The governor ordinarily carries on such relations as exist
between the state and other states or the government of the
United States. If, during the recess of the general assembly,
an insurrection or other disorder arise in the state which the
militia is unable to cope with, it is the duty of the governor to
call upon the United States government for assistance to meet
the emergency. In 1894, during the Chicago railroad strike,
Governor Altgeld declined to call upon the United States gov-
42 Constitution, article v, section 14, article xn, section 3 ; Hurd's Revised
Statutes, chapter 129, sections 3, 118.
43 Report of the Attorney-General, 1906, p. 56, 371-372; Opinions of the
Attorney-General, 1915, p. 78-81.
THE GOVERNOR 233
ernment for assistance, but President Cleveland nevertheless
sent troops into the state for the purpose of enforcing the laws
of the United States in spite of the protest of the governor,
who denounced the action of the president as a violation of the
fundamental right of local self-government. The action of the
president, however, was subsequently upheld by the supreme
court of the United States. 44
The governor is also the agent of the state in its dealings
with other states in connection with the extradition of fugitives.
When a person who is accused of having committed a crime
in Illinois has escaped into another state, it is the duty of the
governor of Illinois to make requisition upon the governor of
the state to which the fugitive has fled to deliver him up. If
he has escaped to a foreign country, the governor may call
upon the secretary of state of the United States to make the
request for the extradition upon the authorities of such foreign
country. When a person accused of a crime in another state
has escaped into Illinois, it is the duty of the governor of Illi-
nois to give him up upon demand of the proper authority, of
the other state. The governor, however, may first hold a hear-
ing in order to satisfy himself as to the regularity of the pro-
ceedings, and if he deems it inexpedient to give the prisoner up,
he cannot be compelled by legal process to do so. 45
Under the constitution, the governor is authorized to grant
pardons, reprieves, and commutations of sentence for all
offenses against the state, whether felonies or misdemeanors. 46
The governor cannot pardon a person who is being tried for
an offense against the state but must wait until after his convic-
tion. The governor might even pardon a person after his re-
lease upon the expiration of the term for which he was sen-
tenced, if new evidence conclusively proves his innocence. The
effect of this is to restore to the ex-convict the rights of citizen-
ship which he forfeited as a result of his conviction. A pardon
44 In re Debs, 158 United States, 564.
45 Report and Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1914, p. 158-159; Kentucky
<v. Dennison, 24 Howard (United States), 66.
46 Article v, section 13.
234 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
under these circumstances, however, would be a rather empty
consolation, but the state makes no general provision for in-
demnity in such cases, which, on the whole, seldom occur.
The exercise by the governor of the pardoning power is
subject to such regulations as may be provided by law relative
to the manner of applying therefore. The legislature has pro-
vided that application shall be made to the governor by petition
in writing giving the facts of the case and the reasons why the
petition should be granted, accompanied by statements of the
judge and prosecuting attorney who figured in the case, and a
notice of the application shall be published in a newspaper of
the county where the conviction was had. 47 These provisions
are intended to prevent ex parte proceedings and to bring to
light all facts bearing on the case. Prior to 1897 governors
were much burdened with the consideration of applications for
pardon, and in some cases perhaps yielded unwisely to the en-
treaties of friends of convicts. Governor Altgeld especially
was severely criticized for alleged undue and excessive exercise
of the pardoning power. Among those whom he pardoned
were certain so-called anarchists who had participated in the
Haymarket riot of 1886. A double lynching which occurred at
Danville in 1895 was said to have been inspired by the fear
that the governor might pardon the prisoners. 48 In his first
regular message to the general assembly, Governor Tanner
recommended the creation of a board of pardons in order to
assist the governor in the exercise of the power and to remedy
some of the abuses that had grown up in connection with it. 49
Accordingly by an act of 1897, the legislature created the
state board of pardons, composed of three members appointed
by the governor and senate. The manner of applying for par-
dons since the creation of this board is much the same as be-
fore except that the notice of application is addressed to the
board and the petition for pardon is filed with the board in-
stead of with the governor. The board holds hearings on ap-
47 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 1043, sections i and 2.
48 Chicago Tribune, May 28, 1895.
49 Senate Journal, 1897, p. 173.
THE GOVERNOR 235
plications for pardons or commutations and makes a report on
each case to the governor accompanied by the conclusions and
recommendations of the board. Such recommendations, how-
ever, have merely advisory force and the governor may disre-
gard them if he sees fit. The governor is ordinarily too much
occupied with other business to give personal attention to each
case, and therefore usually follows the recommendations of the
board. By an act of 1899, tne board was given the further
power of passing upon the cases of prisoners who desire to be
released on parole. In order to avoid encroachment upon the
governor's constitutional power of pardon, the final release of
the prisoners is made to depend upon the approval of the gov-
ernor. 50 By the consolidation act of 1917, the state board of
pardons is abolished and its powers and functions are trans-
ferred to the newly created state department of public wel-
fare. 51 The introduction of the parole and probation systems
in Illinois has reduced the necessity for the frequent exercise by
the governor of his power of pardon or commutation. The
governor may sometimes exercise his power of pardon, commu-
tation or reprieve for some ulterior purpose. Thus Governor
Dunne granted a reprieve to a man sentenced to be hanged for
murder in Jackson county, not because there was any doubt
as to his guilt but with the object of securing from the sheriff
in charge definite assurance that the execution would be car-
ried out in as orderly, decent, and private a manner as prac-
ticable.
Among the miscellaneous functions of the governor is that
of presiding over the state canvassing board which meets to
canvass the votes for United States senators, representatives
in congress, and in the state legislature and for various state
officers. Upon the governor is also laid the ministerial duty of
issuing certificates of election and announcing by proclamation
the results of the canvass. If the governor, however, fails to
perform such duty, he cannot be compelled by mandamus to do
B0 Report and Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1914, p. 440-443; Kurd's
Revised Statutes, chapter 38, section 502; People v. Nowasky, 254 Illinois, 146.
61 Laws of 1917, p. 27.
236 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
so. 52 The governor is also ex officio a member of the state
primary canvassing board, and of various other boards.
The result of an election for the uniting of counties is also
set forth in a proclamation of the governor. Under the seven-
teenth amendment to the constitution of the United States the
governor may cause vacancies in the representation of Illinois
in the United States senate to be filled by popular election, or
may by law be authorized to fill them by temporary appoint-
ments. In the case of vacancies in some state elective offices,
such as judges of the state supreme or circuit courts, the gov-
ernor may cause them to be filled either by issuing writs of elec-
tion or by making appointments, according to whether the un-
expired portion of the term is more or less than one year in
length. Other vacancies, such as in the state legislature and in
the lower house of congress can be filled only by writ of election
issued by the governor. 53
Under the charter of the Illinois Central railroad, the gov-
ernor is made a sort of state railroad commissioner with refer-
ence to this company through his power to pass upon the cor-
rectness of the accounts of the railroad in order to determine
the amount of the seven per cent gross receipts tax. In a spe-
cial message to the legislature in January, 1907, Governor
Deneen attacked the railroad company on the ground that im-
portant items of income had not been included in the company's
report of gross receipts. At the goverrfor's instigation a suit
was started by the attorney-general which resulted in a decision
by the supreme court requiring the railroad company to give a
proper accounting. 54
62 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 78 ; People ex. rel. <v. Dunne,
258 Illinois, 441; Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 459.
53 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, sections 129, 130, and 131. The gov-
ernor is also empowered to approve the bonds of certain state officers.
54 Private Laws of 1851, p. 71; State v. Illinois Central Railroad Company,
246 Illinois, 188.
XL STATE OFFICERS, BOARDS, AND COMMIS-
SIONS
STATE officers, in general, are those whose duties are co-
extensive with the state, and they are thus distinguished
from county and local officers. 1 On account of the requirement
that appropriations for the pay of members and officers of the
general assembly and for the salaries of the officers of the gov-
ernment shall contain no provision on any other subject, it be-
comes a question of practical importance to distinguish between
officers and employees. 2 In the language of the constitution,
" An office is a public position created by the Constitution or
law, continuing during the pleasure of the appointing power,
or for a fixed time, with a successor elected or appointed. An
employment is an agency, for a temporary purpose, which
ceases when that purpose is accomplished." 3 The legislature
has equal power to create offices and employments, and to pro-
vide for the method of filling them, where this is not prescribed
by the constitution. The constitution provides that no person
shall be eligible to any lucrative office under the state, who at
the same time holds a seat in the general assembly, nor to any
office of profit or trust in the state who has been convicted of
bribery, perjury, or other infamous crimes or who, as collector
or holder of public moneys, has failed to make proper account-
ing therefor. The general assembly may itself appoint employ-
ees, but cannot appoint or elect officers. 4
Next in rank to the governor among state officers stands
1 Evans v. People, 247 Illinois, 547; but see City of Chicago v. Wright, (x)
Illinois, 318.
2 Constitution, article IV, section 16.
3 Constitution, article V, section 24; see also Fergus <v. Russel, 270 Illinois,
304. The distinction made by the court, however, is difficult of practical applica-
tion.
4 Constitution, article iv, section 3, 4, article v, section 10.
237
238 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the lieutenant governor, who must have the same qualifications
and be elected at the same time and for the same term as the
governor. Unlike the governor and other state officers, how-
ever, he is not required to reside at the seat of government dur-
ing his term of office and receives a much smaller salary,
namely $2,500 per annum. In case of the death, conviction on
impeachment, failure to qualify, resignation, absence from the
state, or other disability of the governor, the lieutenant gover-
nor assumes the powers, duties, and emoluments of the office
during the remainder of the term, or until the disability shall
be removed. 5 When such vacancy occurs in the governor's
office, the lieutenant governor becomes merely acting governor
and at the same time retains the office of lieutenant governor. 6
Ordinarily, however, the only function which the lieutenant
governor performs is that of acting as presiding officer of the
senate. He has no vote in the senate except when that body
is equally divided; nor does he ordinarily participate in de-
bate, except that he may speak to points of order in preference
to other members. He is ex officio a member of the executive
committee of the senate. 7 During the organization of the
senate at the beginning of the first regular session in a new
administration, the lieutenant governor under the previous ad-
ministration continues to preside over the senate until it is or-
ganized and the new state officers are declared duly elected.
As presiding officer of the senate during its organization the
lieutenant governor, since there is no committee on credentials
yet chosen, must necessarily determine, temporarily, who is
entitled to be sworn in and seated as members of that body. 8
The secretary of state, like the lieutenant governor, is
elected at the same time and for the same term as the governor.
He thus derives his authority from the same source as that of
the governor and is consequently not under the superior admin-
istrative control of the governor. His duties are prescribed,
5 Constitution, article v, section 17.
6 Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. 162.
7 Senate Journal, 1915, p. 12, 18.
8 Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 457.
STATE OFFICERS 239
not by the governor, but by the constitution and statutes. Thus,
under the constitution he is made keeper of the great seal of
the state, to be used by him, officially, as directed by law. His
duties are of a very miscellaneous character. Thus, he calls
the house of representatives to order at the opening of each
new assembly and presides over it until a temporary presid-
ing officer has been chosen and has taken his seat. 9 He is the
keeper of the public records and documents of the state and
custodian of the buildings, grounds, furniture, and supplies of
the state at Springfield. He has important functions to per-
form in connection with primary and general elections; he
grants charters and certificates of incorporation, registers mo-
tor vehicles, and licenses chauffeurs. He was formerly ex
officio state sealer of weights and measures and is still ex officio
member of certain state boards. It will be seen that his duties
are of a very heterogeneous character, and many of them
might well be transferred to other officers or departments of
the state government.
One of the most important of the older constitutional state
officers is the attorney-general, who is elected by popular vote
at the same time and for the same term as the governor. He
receives an annual salary of $10,000 and is required by law
to turn all fees collected by him into the state treasury. The
powers and duties of the attorney-general are to some extent
determined by the common law, but for the most part they are
defined by statute. In general he appears in all cases be-
fore the courts in which the state is a party or interested and
defends actions brought against any state officer in his official
capacity. He represents the state before the court of claims
and brings proceedings for the enforcement of the state laws.
In his discretion he may at certain stages of the proceedings
abandon the prosecution. 10 An important phase of his duties
consists in acting as legal advisor to the governor, other state
officers, the general assembly and either branch or any com-
9 Constitution, article IV, section 9, article V, section 22.
10 People v. Spring Lake Drainage and Levee District, 253 Illinois, 479.
2 4 o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
mittee thereof, to whom he is required, when requested, to
give written opinions upon constitutional or legal questions.
He is not required to give official opinions to municipal or
other local officers nor to private individuals but may, as a mat-
ter of courtesy, do so. Among his miscellaneous duties, he
served formerly as ex officio member of the board of commis-
sioners of state contracts; and, by an act of 1913, he exer-
cises general supervision over the assessment and collection of
the state inheritance tax. 11
In spite of his important powers, the legal business of the
state has not heretofore been concentrated in the hands of the
attorney-general. It has been divided among the attorney-
general, the special attorneys for various state boards, depart-
ments, and commissions, and the local prosecuting attorneys,
known as states attorneys. Neither the special attorneys nor
the states attorneys have been under any effective control by
the attorney-general. The constitutionality of the practice of
employing special attorneys for state departments and boards,
though sanctioned by legislative enactments, has been ques-
tioned by Attorneys-general Howland J. Hamlin, William H.
Stead, and Patrick J. Lucey. 12 No authoritative decision upon
this question, however, was had until 1915 when the supreme
court held, that "The Attorney General is the chief law officer
of the State and the only officer empowered to represent the
people in any suit or proceeding in which the State is the real
party in interest, except where the constitution or a constitu-
tional statute may provide otherwise, and .... he is
the sole official adviser of the executive officers and of all
boards, commissions, and departments of the State govern-
ment;" and, consequently, an appropriation to the state insur-
ance superintendent for the legal services of special counsel is
unconstitutional and void. 13 The law business of the state is
thus largely concentrated in the hands of the attorney-general,
11 Laws of 1913, p. 513.
12 Report of the Attorney-General, 1901-1902, p. 7, 391; 1908, p. ix; Report
of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 957.
13 Fergus v. Russel, 270 Illinois, 304.
Vote for Attorney-
General,
November 3, 1908 ^^E
Over 1,000
Republican plurality
Less than 1,000
Republican plurality
Less than 1,000
Democratic plurality
Over 1,000
Democratic plurality
STATE OFFICERS 241
though he may assign assistant attorneys from his office to take
care of the litigation of particular state boards and commis-
sions.
Some lack of concentrated authority in the handling of the
state's legal business, however, still exists on account of the
practical independence of the states attorneys. It has been
recommended by Attorney-General Lucey that the legislature
should give the attorney-general supervisory power over the
states attorneys by vesting in him the power of removal for
incompetency or neglect of duty and by giving him the right of
directing the states attorneys in the conduct of the business of
their offices, so as to " simplify the matter of minor prosecutions
now conducted by the several State boards and commissions "
and to " give to the Attorney General the right to instruct and
order the State's attorney of any county to handle any matter
that might be pending in his county." 14
Among the important financial officers of the state are the
state treasurer and the auditor of public accounts. They are
chosen by popular vote at the same time as the governor and
other state officers, but the treasurer's term is only two years,
while that of the governor and heads of departments is four
years. An election for treasurer consequently also occurs in
the middle of the term of the governor and at the same time
with the election of the state superintendent of public instruc-
tion. The term of the treasurer was made shorter than that of
the other state officers with the object of preventing possible
abuses which might occur if the tenure of office were too great.
With the same object in view the treasurer was made ineligible
to succeed himself during the two years next after the end of
his term. If, however, the treasurer gives adequate security
for good behavior and the proper handling of the public funds,
which the governor is authorized to require of him, no good
reason appears why he should not also serve for a term equal in
length to that of the governor and other state officers.
The treasurer is charged by law with duties connected with
14 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 960.
242 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the receipt, safekeeping, and disbursement of state moneys.
He cannot receive or disburse any funds, however, except upon
the order or warrant of the state auditor. His functions are
thus largely of a ministerial character, but he may exercise
the discretionary power of selecting certain banks as state de-
positories. Prior to 1908, Illinois practiced what is known as
the independent treasury system. That is, in legal contempla-
tion, the moneys of the state, as soon as they reached the state
treasurer, were put in a strong box in his office and kept there
until drawn out in accordance with law. The state treasurer
had no authority to loan state funds nor to deposit them in
banks. In practice, however, it was alleged that the law was
not always strictly complied with and that state funds were
sometimes loaned, while the state treasurer benefited personally
from the interest thereon. In 1906, the candidate for the re-
publican nomination for state treasurer made it a condition of
his taking the place on the ticket that the state platform declare
for the return to the state treasury of all interest on public
money. 15 In 1908 an act was passed directing the deposit by
the state treasurer of state funds " in such banks in the cities
of the State as in the opinion of the treasurer are secure and
which shall pay the highest rate of interest to the State for such
deposits." 16 There are now several hundred depository banks
throughout the state, but no adequate means are provided for
holding the state treasurer to account for the interest on public
money.
In order to act as a check upon the treasurer, a separate
financial officer, the auditor of public accounts, is provided.
His main function is to see that no money belonging to the
state is expended except in accordance with appropriations
made by law. He thus in reality represents the legislature and
acts as its executive agent to safeguard the appropriations, and
from this point of view it would seem to be preferable that he
be appointed by the legislature rather than elected by popular
15 Chicago Tribune, August 19, 1906, January 12, 1907.
16 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 130, section 22.
STATE OFFICERS 243
vote. The auditor publishes at the conclusion of each legisla-
tive session a statement of the appropriations made at that ses-
sion. He has no special control or influence, however, over the
policy or expediency of making the appropriations. The audi-
tor of public accounts and the state treasurer both serve as ex
offido members of various state boards, such as the for-
mer board of commissioners of state contracts and the state
tax levy board, which fixes the rate of taxation for state pur-
poses.
Prior to 1906, it had for many years been the custom for
state treasurers and auditors to appropriate to their personal
use certain funds belonging to the state through what was
known as the " registered bond fee " system. Such funds con-
sisted of taxes levied and collected to defray the costs to the
state of registering municipal bonds and disbursing the bond
funds. At the instance of Governor Deneen, the attorney-
general brought suit against ex-auditors and ex-treasurers for
the recovery of money thus illegally withdrawn. Upon appeal
to the supreme court, it was held that the state was entitled to
recover such funds with interest from the time when the de-
mand was made for their return. 17 The amount of money in-
volved was about a third of a million dollars.
Prior to 1911, it was customary for many state and local
officers and institutions to collect fees for their official services
and appropriate them to their personal use or to defray the
expenses of performing their services, paying only the balance,
if any, into the public treasury. Some officers received their
compensation entirely from fees, receiving no salary. As early
as 1895 the State Bar Association went on record as in favor
of the abolition of the system of paying public officers by fees
instead of salaries. 18 Finally, in 1911, it was enacted that all
moneys received by state officers, boards, commissions, depart-
ments, and institutions for and on behalf of the state from fees
or other sources should be paid into the state treasury. Such
^Report of the Attorney-General, 1908, p. xxii.
18 Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar Association, 1895, p. 152; 1898, part 2,
P- 13-
244 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
funds, therefore, cannot be expended except as authorized by
appropriation acts of the general assembly. 19 The consolida-
tion act of 1917 also provided that the gross amount of money
received by every state department, belonging to the state, shall
be paid into the state treasury without delay and without any
deduction on account of fees or other charges. 20
The state treasurer receives from the county treasurers or
collectors the proceeds of state taxes collected, at stated inter-
vals, and the county treasurers are also required to make re-
ports regarding such taxes to the state auditor. Neither the
auditor nor the treasurer, however, had formerly any super-
visory power over the reports of the county treasurers. It
sometimes happened that large sums of money belonging to the
state lay in the county treasuries which the state may have
greatly needed, but the county treasurers could not be required
by the state treasurer to pay the money to the state until the
date specified in the statute. By a recent act, however, the
state control over county collectors is strengthened. 21
In 1901 a bill was passed by the general assembly, but
vetoed by Governor Yates, the design of which was to central-
ize the supervision of all public accounts in the hands of the
state auditor. At the following session in 1903, a bill was
introduced to create a state board of public accounts, to be
composed of the state auditor, the president of the board of
charities, and a public accountant. The work to be under-
taken by the board was to prescribe the way in which all state
accounts should be kept, to publish quarterly the condition of
the state's finances, and to publish the payroll of all state insti-
tutions in short, to systematize the business of the state and
give to the public an account of the expenditure of its money. 22
This bill, however, also failed to become a law.
The efficiency and economy committee, created in 1913,
recommended the establishment of a state finance commission,
19 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 102, section u; Report and Opinions of
the Attorney-General, 1913, p. 164.
20 Laws of 1917, p. 14.
* l lbid., p. 664.
22 Chicago Tribune, May 14, 1901, March 23, 1903.
STATE OFFICERS 245
to be composed of the state auditor, state treasurer and three
appointive members. The auditor was to be empowered to
audit the accounts of state officers and institutions and also of
certain local officers, to investigate and enforce the collection
of state revenues, and to issue to the fee-collecting offices cer-
tificates for which fees are paid, as a means of auditing collec-
tions from such sources. 23 These recommendations, however,
have not yet been put into force. The consolidation act of
1917, though creating a state finance department, could not, of
course, materially change the position of the state treasurer
and auditor, who are constitutional officers. The act might,
however, have affected the statutory powers of the state con-
stitutional officers, but failed to do so. Thus, the attorney-
general still retains the power of collecting the inheritance tax,
the auditor of public accounts still has charge of the supervision
of banks and building and loan associations, and the secretary
of state continues to supervise some corporations and to en-
force the automobile and anti-trust laws. The existence of
these statutory powers in the hands of independent, elective,
constitutional officers tends to disintegrate the administration;
they should be transferred to other agencies.
The relation of the heads of state executive departments,
such as secretary of state, attorney-general, state treasurer, and
auditor, to the governor is one of independence rather than of
subordination. He has no power to appoint them, except in
the case of a vacancy occurring before the end of a term, nor to
remove them for good and sufficient cause. They are required
by law to make periodical reports to the governor, and he may
require information from them at any time upon any subject
relating to their duties. For the most part, however, they are
subject to the control of the legislature, partly through the
possibility of impeachment but more especially through the
passage of laws prescribing their powers and duties within the
limits of the constitution. The power and duties of executive
officers are partly prescribed by the constitution and partly pre-
28 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 180.
246 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
scribed by law. 24 The legislature may thus impose upon the
executive officers of the state such duties as it sees fit, not incon-
sistent with their duties imposed by the constitution; and it may
change their duties from time to time, transfer them from one
officer to another, or require two or more of the officers to
cooperate in the same work to such extent as it may deem best.
It has even been held in regard to the secretary of state that,
even in the performance of such duties as are imposed upon
him by the constitution, he is not entirely independent of the
legislature. 25 In order to promote harmony and efficiency of
administration, the executive officers of the state should be sub-
ject to appointment and removal by the governor. Such a re-
form, however, would, of course, require constitutional amend-
ment.
One of the most conspicuous developments in state admin-
istration of Illinois during recent decades has been the creation
of numerous administrative agencies, known collectively as
state boards and commissions. The investigations of the effi-
ciency and economy committee in 1914 showed that, at that
time, there were more than a hundred separate agencies of this
character in the state. The large extent and varied conditions
found in the state, together with its prominence in agriculture,
industry, and manufacturing, has operated as one of the prin-
cipal causes in producing this extraordinary number of such
agencies, which is surpassed by only two or three states in the
union. The expansion of the state administration through the
creation of boards and commissions is in large measure due
to the practical necessity that the state shall undertake new
functions for the regulation of new conditions. Mere legis-
lative action for this purpose has rightly been deemed insuffi-
cient, and administrative agencies have therefore been created.
Among the more important matters which have been brought
under the supervision or control of state boards may be men-
tioned public health, charities and corrections, education, equali-
24 Constitution, article v, section i.
25 People v. McCullough, 25.} Illinois, 9.
STATE OFFICERS 247
zation of taxes, public utilities, agriculture, and the civil
service.
The extent of the powers and duties of state boards and
commissions vary from slight supervision to practically com-
plete control. In character, such powers are, for the most part,
of an executive or administrative nature; but they also fre-
quently are granted powers of a subsidiary legislative charac-
ter, such as issuing rules and regulations, or of a quasi-judicial
character, such as holding hearings, issuing subpoenas, and tak-
ing testimony. In general, it may be said that state administra-
tive agencies are created for the purpose of enforcing or super-
vising the enforcement of a portion of the substantive law of
the state. Thus, the Illinois industrial board, created in 1913,
was charged with the supervision of the enforcement of -the
workmen's compensation law. The state board of health has
been charged with the enforcement of various laws such as that
requiring registration of births and deaths. For the complete
enforcement of such acts, however, the boards are dependent
upon the cooperative action of other authorities. Thus, for the
prosecution of the violation of the act mentioned the board of
health is dependent on the states attorney of the county in
which the violation occurs. Similarly, prosecutions for the vio-
lation of the pure food law of Illinois are under the control
of the states attorney of the proper county. The unreliability
of local police officers and constables in cooperation with state
boards in enforcing state laws has sometimes led to the vest-
ing of police functions in the boards themselves or their agents.
Thus, the Illinois fish and game commission, its wardens and
deputies, were empowered, by an act of 1915, to arrest, with-
out warrant, anyone violating the provisions of the fish and
game law. 26
The action of state administrative agencies in enforcing the
law intrusted to their care, however, is in nearly all cases sub-
ject to judicial review, in order that individual rights may not
be jeopardized by arbitrary administrative action. Thus, the
26 Laws of 1915, p. 461, 670, 710.
248 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
lawfulness and reasonableness of any order of the public util-
ities commission is made subject to review by the courts. 27
The administrative action of state boards and commissions is
sometimes paralyzed through the issuance of injunctions by
the courts. Some recent tendencies, however, may be dis-
cerned in the direction of greater conclusiveness of the deter-
minations by state administrative agencies. Thus, the decisions
of the state industrial board were made conclusive unless re-
viewed in accordance with certain restrictive regulations. The
statute creating the state board of examiners of architects au-
thorized the board to revoke the licenses of architects on speci-
fied grounds after a hearing, and the supreme court upheld the
constitutionality of the grant on the ground that due process of
law in revoking a license does not necessarily consist of judicial
proceedings in court. 28 In a recent decision construing the pow-
ers of the state industrial board, the supreme court held that
the decision of the board can be reviewed for errors of law
only and that, in the absence of fraud, both the circuit court and
the supreme court are bound by the decision of the industrial
board if there is any legal evidence to support it. 29
Even this slight tendency toward greater conclusiveness of
administrative determinations and the corresponding narrow-
ing of the scope of judicial review is a recognition of the fact
that the danger of abridging individual rights through arbi-
trary administrative action may be a lesser evil than the danger
to the general welfare resulting from placing too great a curb
upon the speed and efficiency of administrative action.
The internal organization of state administrative agencies
is subject to the close control of the legislature, both through
the passage of the laws creating the boards, prescribing thei-r
powers and providing for the number of their staffs and em-
ployees and also through the power of appropriating the neces-
27 Laws of 1913, p. 495-496; State Public Utilities Commission v. Toledo,
St Louis, and Western Railroad Company, 267 Illinois, 93.
28 Laics of 1915, p. 410; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter loa, section 10;
Klafter v. State Board of Examiners of Architects, 259 Illinois, 15; Lawyers
Reports Annotated, new series, 46:532.
29 Munn v. Industrial Board of Illinois, 274 Illinois, 70.
STATE OFFICERS 249
sary funds for paying the salaries and expenses. The general
assembly began, in 1895, the practice of itemizing the appro-
priations, so that at present, such appropriation acts usually
enumerate the various clerks and employees of the board,
specifying the exact salary to be paid each. They also fre-
quently go into great detail in specifying the exact sums that
may be disbursed for each item of expense. Thus, the general
assembly of 1915 appropriated to the state industrial board
$364 per annum for towels and $60 per annum for ice and
water. 30 In many cases, however, a lump sum is also appro-
priated for contingent expenses, as it is impossible for the gen-
eral assembly to foresee in every case all financial needs that
may arise. In 1917, a plan was formulated which seeks to
adopt a uniform classification for all appropriations.
State administrative agencies created by legislative authori-
zation, have, for the most part, been organized on the collegial
principle. Provisions have also frequently been embodied in
the law requiring minority representation on state boards.
This practice, however, tends to divide responsibility and has
been condemned by the efficiency and economy committee, on
the ground that it facilitates bipartisan combinations for the
control of the offices at the disposal of the board. It has also
been observed that the device of bipartisan representation
" enables those boards to be particularly successful in securing
large appropriations, .... and also enables them
without great difficulty to thwart any threatened investigation,"
for the "washing of dirty linen" in public would be equally
injurious to the interests of both parties. 31 In the case of the
state board of equalization the collegial principle is apparently
utilized for the purpose of giving representation to the differ-
ent geographical sections of the state.
Moreover, the various state boards have not been very
well articulated with each other and with the other agencies
and departments of the state government. The members of
30 Laws of 1915, p. 232.
31 Proposed Legislative Measures to Carry into Effect the Recommendations
of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 16-17.
250 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
state boards are usually appointed by the governor with the
consent of the senate. 32 But the device of gradual renewal or
overlapping terms of such members hampers somewhat the
control which the governor might otherwise be able to exercise
over them. Moreover, the relations between different boards
having to do with closely related services have not been care-
fully worked out, with the result that some matters have been
either inadequately regulated or have escaped supervision alto-
gether. As will be seen, however, many of these difficulties
have been overcome through the abolition of a number of
boards by the consolidation act of 1917.
In addition to the above difficulties and evils which have
grown up in connection with the board system it has been
noted that the expenditures of the state government have in-
creased hand in hand with the increase of state boards. The
biennial appropriations have grown from approximately six-
teen million dollars in 1905 to about forty-six million dollars in
1915. In the former year this was about three dollars per
capita; in 1915 it was about seven and one-half dollars per
capita. Of the amount appropriated in 1915, about fifteen
million dollars annually were to be expended by state boards
and commissions.
Much of this increase has of course been due to the general
rise of prices and the consequent increasing cost of carrying on
governmental operations. It has also been due in part to the
assumption by the state of expenditures for new purposes, such
as increased state aid to education, charitable administration,
and the promotion of good roads. There has been a growing
feeling, however, that much of this increased cost of running
the state government has been due to the increase of state
boards, the cumbrousness and duplication of governmental
machinery, and uneconomical methods of discharging public
functions. The realization of these facts has led to a move-
ment for the abolition of useless boards and the consolidation
32 Exceptions to this rule are the state board of equalization and the board
of trustees of the University of Illinois, which are elective by popular vote.
STATE OFFICERS 251
of others into a more logical unified system. As early as 1897
the evils of too many state boards were perceived and warned
against by the president of the state bar association. "While
many of these boards are necessary," he declared, "yet the in-
crease is surprising, and indicates a tendency to multiply the
tax eaters at the expense of the taxpayers." 33 In 1899, one
of the leading newspapers in the state denounced editorially
the tendency of the legislature to create too many boards and
commissions. In 1909, a committee of the house of repre-
sentatives, appointed to investigate the charitable, penal, and
reformatory institutions, recommended that these institutions
be consolidated under the management of one board of control.
A special senate committee also made a similar report. The
result was the passage of a law bringing the various state char-
itable institutions under the management of the state board of
administration. In 1913 the fish and game commissions were
consolidated into one commission. The results of these con-
solidations were undoubtedly in the direction of greater econ-
omy and efficiency. This is illustrated by the fact that the total
appropriations asked of the forty-ninth general assembly by the
separate charitable institutions, as stated in the so-called budget
of the legislative reference bureau, amounted to more than a
million and a half dollars more than the total appropriations
requested for all these institutions by the state board of ad-
ministration. 34
In his farewell message to the legislature in January, 1913,
Governor Deneen suggested the creation of a commission for
conducting an " investigation of plans for the coordination of
existing boards and commissions whose duties overlap or are so
similar as to permit of unification and reduction in number
while improving their methods and the economy of their ad-
ministration." 35 Accordingly, by joint resolution of the forty-
33 Address of J. H. Hamline in Proceedings of the Illinois State Ear Asso-
ciation, 1897, part 2, p. 5-6.
34 Chicago Tribune, February 13, 1899; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 23,
section 5 ; Laws of 1913, p. 363 ; Proposed Legislative Measures to Carry into
Effect ^the Recommendations of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 9.
35 Senate Journal, 1913, p. 132.
252 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
eighth general assembly a joint committee, composed of four
senators and four representatives, was created " to investigate
all departments of the State government, including all boards,
bureaus and commissions .... such investigation to
be made with a view of securing a more perfect system of ac-
counting, combining and centralizing the duties of the various
departments, abolishing such as are useless and securing for the
State of Illinois such reorganization that will promote greater
efficiency and greater economy in her various branches of
government." 36
During 1914 the structure of the board system was sub-
jected to an elaborate examination by the efficiency and econ-
omy committee. As a result of its investigations, the commit-
tee reached the following conclusions in regard to the admin-
istrative disintegration produced by the board system :
"Under the existing arrangements inefficiency and waste
necessarily arise from the lack of correlation and cooperation
in the work of different offices and institutions which are carry-
ing out similar or closely related functions. There are separate
boards for each of the State penitentiaries and reformatory
and for each of the State normal schools. There are half a
dozen boards dealing with agricultural interests; and about a
score of separate labor agencies, including four boards dealing
with mining problems and eight free employment offices, each
substantially independent of each other. State finance admin-
istration is distributed between a number of elective and ap-
pointive officials and boards without concentrated responsibil-
ity. The supervision of corporations and of banks, insurance
companies and public utilities is exercised by a series of distinct
departments. State control of public health is divided between
various boards with no effective means of coordination. Nor
is there any official authority for harmonizing the work of the
numerous educational agencies." 37
With regard to the lack of effective supervision and control
36 Laws of 1913, p. 623.
^Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 19.
STATE OFFICERS 253
over the numerous boards, the findings of the committee were
as follows:
"As a result of the absence of any systematic organization
of related services, there is no effective supervision and con-
trol over the various State offices, boards and commissions. It
is true that the greater number of these are under the nominal
supervision of the Governor, through his power of appoint-
ment and removal. But the very number of separate offices
makes impossible the exercise of any adequate control. To a
very large extent each authority is left to determine its own
action; conflict of authority between two or more offices is
often possible; and if harmony and cooperation is secured it
is by voluntary compromise rather than by the advice or de-
cision of a superior authority. Under the present arrange-
ments too many independent authorities have power to make
expenditures subject to no effective centralized control or re-
sponsibility. This situation necessarily leads to waste and
expenditure." 38
As a result of its findings, the committee recommended the
enactment of laws which would introduce greater economy,
efficiency, and concentration of responsibility into the state acj-
ministration. In particular the committee recommended the
consolidation and regrouping of the administrative services
into ten principal departments, namely, those of finance, edu-
cation, law, trade and commerce, labor and mining, health,
agriculture, public works, charities and corrections, and mili-
tary affairs.
At the next regular legislative session, that of 1915, after
the report of the committee was submitted, bills were intro-
duced designed to carry out the recommendations of the com-
mittee; but very little was done at that session toward putting
the recommendations of the committee into effect. The most
important act actually passed was one providing for the ap-
pointment by the governor and senate of a superintendent of
printing and providing for systematic methods in contracting
38 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 21.
254 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
for the purchase of printing and stationery. 39 To have carried
out the recommendations in a thoroughgoing fashion at that
time would have involved the abolition of many positions in
the state service, which, however useless such positions might
be, could not be done without arousing powerful opposition
from the officeholders affected. Instead of consolidating or
abolishing administrative agencies the forty-ninth general as-
sembly created about a dozen new and independent boards and
commissions. Two years later, however, the conditions were
more propitious. In the campaign of 1916 the candidates for
governor vied with each other in advocating the carrying out
of the program of reform in state administrative organiza-
tion indicated by the efficiency and economy committee. The
platforms' of the two leading parties, adopted in September of
that year, each contained planks on the subject. The demo-
cratic plank declared in favor of the " enactment of laws for the
consolidation of the different commissions of the state, as
recommended in the report of the efficiency and economy com-
mission." The republican plank favored the " consolidation of
the boards, institutions and different departments, thereby elim-
inating useless and unnecessary offices and positions, avoiding
overlapping functions and increasing efficiency."
Immediately after his election Governor Lowden had
prepared a tentative draft of the consolidation bill and began
to take energetic steps to carry out this plank of the republican
platform. In his inaugural address to the fiftieth general as-
sembly in January, 1917, he declared that "one of the impera-
tive needs of the State is the consolidation of its multiplied
agencies into a few principal departments." "Administrative
agencies have been multiplied in bewildering confusion. They
have been created without reference to their ability, economi-
cally and effectively, to administer the laws. Separate boards
govern the penitentiaries, the reformatories, and the educa-
tional institutions. Several boards and commissions have
39 Proposed Legislative Measures to Carry into Effect the Recommendations
of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, passim; Laws of 1915, p. 671.
STATE OFFICERS 255
charge of matters affecting the agricultural interests. Admin-
istration of laws affecting labor is parceled out among numer-
ous agencies, including several boards having jurisdiction of
mining problems and several free employment agencies, each
independent of the other. Our finance administration is cha-
otic, illogical and confused. The administration of the health
laws is divided between boards and commissions, with no
effective means of coordination. Our educational agencies are
not harmonious. Over one hundred officers, boards, agencies,
commissions, institutions, and departments are charged with
the administration of our laws. No systematic organization
exists and no adequate control can be exercised. Diffusion,
rather than concentration and responsibility, mark our sys-
tem." Governor Lowden gave his program for the consolida-
tion of administrative agencies the right of way during the first
few months of his term and declined to allow other matters to
interfere with it. He shrewdly declined to make appointments
to fill places under the old administrative organization as this
would have greatly increased the difficulty of adopting the
simplified plan if it did not entirely kill all chance of success in
putting it through the legislature. Under the skillful leader-
ship of the governor, however, the consolidation bill was intro-
duced shortly after the beginning of the session, referred to
separate or special committees constituted in each house to con-
sider it, and passed both houses by substantial majorities and
went into effect July I, 19 ly. 40
The consolidation act or civil administrative code follows
in the main the recommendations of the efficiency and economy
committee, but with certain modifications. While the commit-
tee had recommended the creation of ten principal depart-
ments, the consolidation act provides for only nine, as follows:
finance, agriculture, labor, mines and minerals, public works
and buildings, public welfare, public health, trade and com-
merce, and registration and education. Each department is
under a head, known as the director, who is appointed for four-
40 Laws of IQI?, p. 2-36.
256 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
year terms by the governor with the consent of the senate.
The principle is thus adopted of having a single officer in-
stead of a board in charge of executive functions. Exceptions
to this rule, however, consist in the provision for the industrial
commission in the department of labor, the public utilities
commission in the department of trade and commerce and the
normal school board in the department of registration and
education. Although nominally placed in the departments indi-
cated, these boards are in reality independent of any control
by the director of such departments. In addition to these
executive boards, advisory and unpaid boards were also at-
tached to some of the departments. More than fifty boards,
bureaus, departments, and officers whose work was taken over
by the nine departments established were specifically abolished.
In each of the nine departments there is an assistant direc-
tor and other officers or heads of bureaus who are appointed
in the same manner as the director. Civil service employees
under the abolished officers and boards are transferred along
with the functions of such abolished boards to the new depart-
ments created. Each department is given a considerable de-
gree of control over its own internal organization. The direc-
tor of each department is empowered to prescribe regulations,
not inconsistent with law, for the government of his depart-
ment, the conduct of its employees, and the distribution and
performance of its business; and each department may employ
necessary employees, under civil service regulations, and fix
their compensation when not fixed by law. The governor is
given no power of transferring services from one department
to another; but one department may under certain circum-
stances require necessary assistance from another department;
and the director of any department may require an employee
of another department, subject to the consent of the superior
officer of the employee, to perform any duty which he might
require of his own subordinates. In order to avoid conflicts
among the departments, it is provided that " the directors of
departments shall devise a practical and working basis for co-
STATE OFFICERS 257
operation and coordination of work, eliminating duplication
and overlapping of functions. They shall, so far as prac-
ticable, cooperate with each other in the employment of serv-
ices and the use of quarters and equipment."
In order further to avoid duplication and friction the de-
partment of finance is empowered "to investigate duplication
of work of departments and the efficiency of the organization
and administration of departments, and to formulate plans
for the better coordination of departments."
In addition to consolidation of departments, the act also
provides for the preparation of a state budget, under the
supervision of the department of finance. Each department,
office, and institution is required to file biennially in the office
of the director of finance on uniform blanks prescribed by the
director estimates of receipts and expenditures for the suc-
ceeding two years, with an explanation of reasons for each
item of expenditure requested. The director of finance is em-
powered to investigate all items and to revise the estimates
before submitting them to the governor for transmittal to the
general assembly. The governor is required to submit to the
general assembly not later than four weeks after its organiza-
tion a state budget, embracing the amounts recommended by
him to be appropriated to the respective departments, offices,
and institutions, and for all other public purposes, the esti-
mated revenues from taxation and from other sources, and
an estimate of the amount required to be raised by taxation.
Thus the budget, when it reaches the general assembly, has
official support and authority of the governor, though it may,
of course, be altered by the general assembly in any way it sees
fit. The submission of such an official budget, backed by the
authority and prestige of the governor, should be an important
step in the direction of more economical expenditure of state
money.
Another step in the same direction is the power of the
department of finance to prescribe uniform rules governing
specifications for purchases of supplies for the several de-
258 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
partments. The actual purchase of most of the supplies
needed by the various state departments and by the charitable,
penal, and reformatory institutions is concentrated in the hands
of the department of public works and buildings.
It should be noted that the consolidation act does not
undertake to reorganize the whole field of state administra-
tion, and certain important agencies are unaffected. The de-
partment of finance does not control the state auditor and
treasurer nor the administration of the revenue laws. The
act does not affect the constitutional officers, such as secretary
of state and attorney-general, nor their constitutional func-
tions. It does not even affect their statutory functions. Many
statutory bodies and agencies are also left outside the new
departmental organization, such as the state board of equaliza-
tion, the board of trustees of the University of Illinois, the
adjutant-general and national guard, the state civil service
commission, the legislative reference bureau, and the state
library. Nevertheless the consolidation act has gone far
toward introducing a scientific and efficient form of adminis-
trative organization in the state government and is undoubtedly
the most important step in this direction which has thus far
been taken by this or by any other state. The actual working,
however, of this efficient and scientifically constructed machin-
ery must still depend largely on the governor and upon the
character of the men whom he appoints to the various
directorships.
XII. ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES
THE process of centralization in state administration has
proceeded along two lines. First, functions formerly
exercised by the localities have been taken over by the state, or,
if left primarily with the localities, have been placed under the
supervision of the state; and, secondly, the state has assumed
functions not previously exercised by any governmental au-
thority. Although some of the functions previously exercised
by the localities have recently been assumed by the state or
brought under state supervision, most of the newer state func-
tions fall in the second of the two classes enumerated. The
assumption by the state of the second class of functions is due
in large measure to the rapid rise, within the last few decades,
of new and complex industrial conditions and economic
phenomena. This increasing complexity of social and indus-
trial conditions, combined with the awakening sense of social
solidarity, necessitates more and more the interference of the
state for the purpose of regulating and controlling the opera-
tions of business and the processes of life. The force of cir-
cumstances and the changes in those varied and manifold
conditions which go to make up the governmental environment
have brought on a new era of state activity. New functions
are undertaken by the state as the result of an effort, partly
instinctive, partly conscious, to adapt itself to changes in this
environment. The assumption by the state of each successive
new function has, as a rule, involved the creation of a state
executive or administrative board, commission, or other similar
agency, to which is intrusted the direct exercise of the func-
tion. The creation of state boards and commissions, there-
fore, has gone hand in hand with the development of centrali-
zation in state administration. In general, such bodies may be
259
26o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
considered as administrative agencies created for the special
purpose of enforcing or supervising the enforcement of a par-
ticular portion of the substantive law of the state. In the pre-
ceding chapter, some of the larger considerations which con-
cern such boards and commissions in general have been noted.
In the present chapter, the special characteristics of certain
particular kinds of state boards and commissions will be con-
sidered in connection with the functional activities of which
they are the instruments. For this purpose there will be chosen
as typical the administration of charities and corrections, the
administration of public health, and the supervision of
corporations.
Prior to 1869 the state charitable institutions in Illinois
were each under the control of a separate board of trustees
which had the exclusive management of the institution, sub-
ject only to slight legislative supervision. Some degree of
centralized supervision over these institutions was provided in
1869 through the creation of the state board of charities.
Such boards, as found in the various states, may be roughly
classified into supervisory boards and boards of control. The
Illinois board, as originally created, was of the supervisory
type. Its powers consisted, for the most part, in making
inspections and investigations, giving advice, making recom-
mendations, and submitting reports to the governor and
legislature. In its report for the year 1900 the board thus
described the situation:
"These fifteen charitable institutions have forty-nine trus-
tees and there are five members of the board of commissioners
of public charities, making in all fifty-four persons who are
charged with the duty of seeing that these institutions are
properly managed under the law. In addition they have
fifteen local treasurers. All of the institutions are under the
supervision of this board. Our duties, however, are merely
advisory, we having no real executive or controlling power.
Under the law we are required to visit each of them at least
twice a year to see that the moneys appropriated for their
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 261
support are economically and judiciously expended, to see
whether their purposes are accomplished and whether the laws
in relation to them are complied with. It also requires us to
inquire and examine into their methods of government and
management, the conduct of their trustees, officers and em-
ployees, the condition of the property and into all matters per-
taining to their usefulness and management. In addition to
this the law requires us to approve their accounts. Notwith-
standing all these requirements this board as constituted has
no such executive power to enforce any of its recommendations
as should be lodged in a central governing body." 1
The lack of adequate control over the state institutions by
the state board gave rise to many abuses and much complaint.
This dissatisfaction was evidenced by the enactment in 1905
of a law designed to place the safeguards of civil service regu-
lations around the appointment of employees in state charitable
institutions. A general reorganization of charitable adminis-
tration was effected by an act of 1909. By this act the separate
boards of trustees over each institution were abolished and the
state board of administration was created and given general
management and control of all the charitable institutions of
the state. The separate treasurers of each institution were
also abolished and the institution funds placed largely in the
hands of the state treasurer. The state board of administra-
tion thus not only displaced the separate boards of trustees in
the practically absolute control of the state charitable institu-
tions, but it was also given some power over local and private
charitable institutions and associations. Thus, before private
associations for the care of dependent and neglected children
could be incorporated, they were subject to the examination
and approval of the state board of administration.
Although the state board of administration was established
as a substitute for the separate boards of trustees, it was not
intended to take the place of the former state board of chari-
ties. It is true that the latter board was abolished by the act
1 Quoted by Garner Report on Charitable and Correctional Institutions, 10.
262 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of 1909, but in its place was created the state charities com-
mission. This body was given powers of visit, investigation,
and recommendation in regard to the institutions under the
control of the state board of administration, as well as other
institutions subject to its supervision. Under the act of 1909,
therefore, there was introduced into Illinois what is known as
the dual system of charitable administration, or a combination
of a board of control with a supervisory or advisory board.
One of the chief objections that might be urged against the
dual system is the possibility of conflict or lack of cooperation
between the two boards. Where the supervisory board, how-
ever, is given no administrative functions, as in Illinois, the
danger of such conflict appears to be slight. It should be
pointed out, moreover, that even from the standpoint of
financial economy the dual system has this advantage, that,
while the board of control may endeavor to secure the more
immediate economies, the ultimate function of the supervisory
board is to promote the much more far-reaching and important
economy of securing, by preventive measures, a proportionate
decrease in the number of persons dependent on the state's
care, and thus incidentally decrease the expenditures of the
state for this purpose.
Under the act of 1909, it was provided that there should
be a fiscal supervisor, to be elected by the board of administra-
tion from among its own members, charged with the financial
oversight of the institutions, and exercising his powers in co-
operation with, and under the supervision of, the board. This
was a compromise intended to secure the advantages of both
the broader point of view of the board and also the specialized
knowledge of the fiscal supervisor. The cooperation of the
superintendents of the various charitable institutions in the
consideration of fiscal matters wherein their familiarity with
conditions is of value was also secured through the annual
meetings of the board of joint estimate, composed of the
superintendents of the several institutions and a committee of
the state board of administration.
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 263
The act of 1909 did not apply to the penal and reformatory
institutions of the state. Each of the penitentiaries was left
under a separate board of commissioners, while the reforma-
tory remained under its. own board of managers. The mem-
bers of the two penitentiary boards and of the reformatory
board together composed the state board of prison industries,
charged with the enforcement of the laws relating to prison
labor. Such labor is carried on mainly for the manufacture of
articles and supplies for state institutions, but it was provided
that any surplus of prison products up to a certain extent which
could not be used in the public institutions might be disposed
of in the open market. The prices of all articles manufactured
by prison labor and furnished to the state or its institutions
were fixed by the board of classification, composed of the presi-
dents of the boards of administration and of prison industries,
together with the auditor of public accounts.
The system of administration of charities and corrections
thus outlined was somewhat cumbrous. Although the two
boards in the dual system of administration may be assigned
entirely different functions so as to avoid the danger of con-
flict, nevertheless, this system is somewhat lacking in the ele-
ments of simplicity and definiteness of responsibility. The bill
of 1909 in its original form had provided for placing the penal
and reformatory, as well as the charitable institutions under the
state board of administration. There seemed to be advantages
to be gained in the grouping of all these institutions under one
central control. In the constitutional convention of 1870, the
proposition was brought forward to create a superintendent of
public charities, with supervision over all the charitable institu-
tions of the state, but it was not adopted. 2 Finally, however,
in 1917, the proposal of 1870 for a single executive head and
the proposal of 1909 for consolidated control over both
charitable and correctional administration was carried into
effect; and the whole system was directly linked with one of
- Debates and Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention of Illinois, 1870,
^749-753-
264 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the chief executive departments of the state government. The
civil administrative code, enacted in 1917, abolished the state
board of administration, the commissioners of the state peni-
tentiaries, the board of managers of the state reformatory, the
board of prison industries, and the board of classification, and
intrusted their powers to a department of public welfare, under
a director appointed by the governor, with the advice and con-
sent of the senate. There was also created in the department
a board of public welfare commissioners, composed of five per-
sons, and charged with functions of an advisory and non-
executive nature. 3
The principal agencies provided for carrying on public
health administration in Illinois are the following: 4 state
board of health, state food commissioner and food standard
commission, state board of pharmacy, state board of dental
examiners, barbers' examining board, and state board of nurse
examiners. Some functions related to public health are per-
formed by the state department of factory inspection, the state
water survey, and the rivers and lakes commission. In addi-
tion to these state agencies, much of the work of public health
administration is in the hands of local agencies, such as county
and municipal boards of health, and boards of trustees of sani-
tary, water, and drainage districts.
The work of the state board of health may be classified
under the following heads: examining and licensing function,
collection and dissemination of information, and measures for
the prevention or eradication of disease. Under the act of
1877 creating the state board of health, that body was given
power to license practitioners of medicine and surgery. But
those who had been practicing for ten years, and holders of
diplomas from medical schools were entitled to licenses from
the board without examination. Others could procure a license
8 Laws of 1917, p. 7, 17, 26.
4 The present tense is here used as of the year 1915, and the statements in
regard to public health administration are taken from the author's report on the
subject, originally published in the Report of the Efficiency and Economy Com-
mittee, 647-653.
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 265
only by passing an examination given by the board. Licenses
were subject to revocation by the board for unprofessional or
dishonorable conduct. By various amendments passed since
the original act and its revision of 1899, the state board of
health has been given wider powers over the admission to the
practice of medicine and surgery, and the powers of the board
have been extended to include the admission to practice of
persons who treat diseases by methods other than those of
medicine and surgery.
By an amendment of 1907 the board is empowered to
establish standards of preliminary education deemed requisite
to admission to a medical college in good standing and to re-
quire satisfactory proof of the enforcement of this standard by
medical colleges. Every applicant for a license must produce
satisfactory proof to the board that he is a graduate of a medi-
cal college in good standing, as may be determined by the
board, and must pass before the board an examination in those
subjects a knowledge of which is commonly required of candi-
dates for the degree of doctor of medicine by reputable medical
colleges in the United States.
The board may confer licenses without examination, how-
ever, upon physicians licensed in other states in which the
requirements of medical registration are deemed by the board
to have been practically equivalent to those in force in Illinois,
and upon physicians who have graduated from medical colleges
in good standing and have passed examination before the
United States army or navy, or the United States public health
and marine hospital service. All licenses granted by the board
must be recorded by the holder in the office of the county clerk
in the county in which he resides or practices within three
months from the date of the license.
Under the act of 1899, the state board of health is em-
powered to refuse to issue licenses to persons guilty of criminal
practice or who advertise under names other than their own or
for other unprofessional or dishonorable conduct and may
revoke licenses for like causes. But before a license can be
266 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
refused or revoked, the applicant or holder is entitled to a
hearing before the board. This act, however, has been con-
strued by the supreme court as having no retroactive effect upon
licenses issued before its passage. Under the act of 1877,
creating the state board of health, that body is given general
supervision of the state system of registration of births and
deaths. The clerical services and safe-keeping of the bureau
of vital statistics are provided by the secretary of state.
By act of May 6, 1903, it is made the duty of every phy-
sician and midwife, who attends the birth of a child, to make,
within thirty days thereafter, a report of the occurrence, with
such other information as may be required by the state board
of health, in writing, to the county clerk of the county in which
the birth takes place. In cities of fifty thousand population,
such reports may be made to the city commissioner of health,
who delivers them to the county clerk, who in turn delivers all
reports to the state board of health. Likewise, reports of
deaths are required to be made by physicians, midwives, and
coroners to the state board of health, unless such deaths occur
in the corporate limits of a city where permits must be secured
before the body may be removed or buried. In such cases
reports are made to the permit-issuing officer, who later for-
wards them to the state board of health. In order to secure
uniformity in the information obtained, it is required that all
such reports of births and deaths shall be made in strict ac-
cordance with forms prescribed by the state board of health.
Blank reports in the prescribed form are to be printed by the
county clerk and distributed free to physicians, midwives, and
coroners.
Previous to 1903, no compensation was paid to persons
making the required reports of births and deaths; and, partly
in consequence of this omission, the law was a dead letter.
Under the law of 1903, however, a fee of twenty-five cents is
allowed for each report of a birth or death; and such fees,
together with the cost of printing blank reports, constitute a
charge upon the counties. Many counties fail to make ap-
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 267
propriation for such expenses, and in many localities the re-
ports are fragmentary and lacking in accuracy.
The object of collecting vital statistics has been described
as being "to give warning of the undue increase of disease or
death that is presumed to be due to preventable cause, and also
to indicate the localities in which sanitary effort is most desir-
able and most likely to be of use." This object cannot be at-
tained without full and accurate statistics running continuously
over a considerable period of time, and such statistics cannot
be even approximately obtained when the collection is de-
pendent in certain essential particulars upon the voluntary ac-
tion of counties.
Reports of deaths are fairly complete from cities and vil-
lages requiring the issuance of burial permits, but deaths in
other parts of the state and births nearly everywhere are very
inadequately reported. There would seem to be a need for a
new birth and death act, perferably one meeting the require-
ments of the United States census bureau.
In addition to collecting vital and mortuary statistics, the
state board of health also conducts investigations into health
conditions in various parts of the state in order to discover the
causes of communicable diseases and to collect the necessary
information as a basis for taking measures for the suppression
of epidemics. The board maintains at Springfield a laboratory
for the diagnosis of diseases and for the examination of speci-
mens of various substances involved in the detection of disease.
By special arrangement, the state water survey at Urbana
takes care of the examination of the sources of water supplies
and the study of the proper disposition of sewage. It makes
chemical analyses of samples of drinking water sent to it for
that purpose. The state board of health distributes diphtheria
antitoxin free of charge to those who may be in need of it and
unable to pay therefor. The board is empowered to appoint
one or more agents in each county for the sale or distribution
of the antitoxin.
Under the head of measures for the prevention or eradica-
268 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tion of disease would be included such matters as the establish-
ment and maintenance of quarantine, the abatement of
nuisances, the control of epidemics in cities, villages, and town-
ships when local authorities fail to take proper steps, the is-
suance of rules and regulations for carrying into effect the
provisions of various acts for the protection of the public
health, and the supervision of sanitary conditions in lodging
houses and hotels in cities of one hundred thousand population
and over. Among the rules and regulations issued by the
board may be mentioned those dealing with the draining, con-
struction, and plumbing of hotels and lodging houses.
To a large extent the state board of health is dependent
upon local authorities and boards for the enforcement of its
rules and regulations. It is made the duty of all local boards
of health, health authorities and police officers, sheriffs, con-
stables, and all other officers and employees of the state or of
any county, village, city or township, to enforce the rules and
regulations that may be adopted by the board. More spe-
cifically it is provided that persons guilty of violating any rule
or regulation of the board shall be liable to a fine not exceed-
ing $200 for each offense and to imprisonment in the county
jail not exceeding six months, or both. At the instance of the
board or its executive officer, it is made the duty of the states
attorney in each county to prosecute all persons in the county
refusing to obey the rules and regulations of the board.
The civil administrative code, enacted in 1917, abolished the
state board of health, the board of pharmacy, the board of
dental examiners, the board of nurse examiners, the board of
barber examiners, the state food commissioner, and the food
standard commission. The powers of the state board of
health, with the exception of its examining functions, were in-
trusted to a department of public health, while the examining
powers of the various health boards were intrusted to a depart-
ment of registration and education, each department being
under a director appointed by the governor with the advice
and consent of the senate.
ADMINISTRATIVE SERVICES 269
" Business corporations and businesses often conducted by
corporations are under the jurisdiction of four separate State
officials, namely, the Secretary of State, the Auditor of Public
Accounts, the Insurance Superintendent, and the State Public
Utilities Commission. The Secretary of State has general
supervision over the incorporation of all corporations not
otherwise provided for. His authority is contained in the
general law and a series of supplementary laws relating to spe-
cial classes of corporations The Auditor of Pub-
lic Accounts has general supervision over banks and banking
institutions, trust companies, title guarantee companies and
building and loan associations; and receives reports from
pawners' societies. He also receives reports from corpora-
tions and railroads for purposes of assessment
All insurance companies, except assessment life and accident
and title guarantee companies, are chartered by the Insurance
Superintendent. Corporations for furnishing life or accident
insurance on the assessment plan must submit their plan of
organization, first to the Insurance Superintendent; if he ap-
proves of the plan he forwards it to the Secretary of State who
then issues a certificate of incorporation. The same process
is followed in making changes in the corporation. All in-
surance companies, except title guarantee companies, are super-
vised by the Insurance Superintendent." 5
"Following the adoption of the Constitution of 1870, a
railroad and warehouse commission was established in 1871,
with important powers of supervision and regulation of rail-
roads and public warehouses. This was one of the leading
measures in the movement of this time for public regulation of
railroads; and the litigation on its constitutionality resulted in
a judicial decision in the case of Munn v. Illinois uphold-
ing the power of the State to regulate business affected with
a public interest. . . . The Public Utility Law of 1913,
which went into effect January i, 1914, repealed the railroad
5 Robinson, " Report on Supervision of Corporations and Related Business/'
Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 701, 702.
270 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
and warehouse commission law .... and established
a new State Public Utilities Commission with jurisdiction and
general supervision over all classes of public utility companies.
This commission consists of five members, appointed by the
governor, with the advice and consent of the Senate, to serve
after the first appointment for six years, one or two
members retiring at a time. Not more than three members
of the commission may be affiliated with the same political
party. The chairman is designated by the governor.
The commission Is authorized and required to approve all
issues of capital stock, bonds and other securities issued by
public utility companies. A corporation desiring to operate a
public utility obtains its charter from the Secretary of State,
but must secure the approval of the Public Utilities Commis-
sion before issuing securities. Annual reports in the form pre-
scribed by the Public Utilities Commission are made directly
to the said commission." 6
The civil administrative code, enacted in 1917, did not
affect the powers of the secretary of state or of the auditor of
public accounts in relation to corporations. It, however,
abolished the insurance superintendent and the state public
utilities commission and vested their powers in a department
of trade and commerce, in which a superintendent of insur-
ance and a public utilities commission are created. This com-
mission, however, is authorized to administer the public utilities
law without any supervision or control by the director of that
department.
6 Robinson, "Report on Supervision of Corporations and Related Business,"
Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 702-703, 735, 736.
XIII. CIVIL SERVICE AND CIVIL SERVICE
REFORM
THE filling of positions in the public service remained
under the spoils system in Illinois, with but few excep-
tions, until 1895. Conditions under this system became par-
ticularly odious in Chicago, and the evils manifested under it
were especially flagrant in that city. During the earlier his-
tory of the state, when governmental operations and activities
were comparatively simple and no great amount of training
or technical skill in office was required, the filling of offices with
party workers probably did no great harm. This practice was
based not only on the idea that "to the victors belong the
spoils," but also on the supposedly democratic principle of ro-
tation in office. But, with the rise of the new industrial age and
the accompanying assumption by the state and the cities of new
economic and semi-scientific functions, the feeling grew and
became widespread that the general welfare could not be
properly safeguarded unless public offices were filled on the
merit principle with men having the technical training and
qualifications for the positions. Yet such was the force of the
spoils system that, in his biennial message of 1895, Governor
Altgeld suggested the "urgent need of legislation in regard to
the civil service that will relieve executive officers, both state
and municipal, of the constant and overwhelming importunity
for place." 1
In order to remedy these conditions, a movement was in-
augurated by the civic federation and the civil service reform
league to secure a law from the legislature establishing the
merit system in Chicago. A bill drawn up by a committee
representing these organizations was introduced in the legis-
lature in January, 1895. It was passed by both houses in
1 Reports General Assembly, 1895, i : 20.
271
272 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
March with an emergency clause requiring a two-thirds vote,
signed by Governor Altgeld, and went into effect immediately. 2
It was a general optional law, applying only to such cities as
might adopt it by popular choice. A vigorous campaign was
immediately begun in Chicago to secure its adoption. Both
the republican and democratic candidates for mayor of that
city publicly supported it. Within two weeks after the bill was
signed by the governor, it was adopted by the voters of Chi-
cago, by nearly fifty thousand majority. Similarly favorable
action was subsequently taken by Evanston, Springfield, and
Waukegan. By the provisions of the act, a commission of
three persons appointed by the mayor in each city adopting the
act is placed in charge of its administration. The members
of the commission serve for three-year terms subject to the
power of the mayor to remove them for cause, and not more
than two of them may be members of the same political party.
The act applied to all officers and employees in the service of
the city with certain exceptions, including those elected by the
people, or whose appointment is subject to confirmation by the
city council, judges and clerks of election, members of the
board of education, the superintendent and teachers of schools,
heads of departments, and members of the law department. 3
All other positions in the city service were to be classified by
the commission and examinations were to be held to provide an
eligible list from which appointments were to be made to fill
vacancies in the classified service. Where practicable, such
2 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 24, section 446 ff.
3 Among those exempt from the civil service law in Chicago were bridge-
tenders, because they were appointed by the mayor and confirmed by the council.
They constituted one of the most demoralizing remnants of the traditional spoils
system in that city. In 1901, the Citizen's Association of Chicago, after a careful
investigation showed that in many cases " saloonkeepers and politicians are car-
ried on the pay roll as bridgetenders, who employ substitutes to do their work
and make a large profit." It showed, too, that in other cases bridgetenders
" receive for their own services twice what they pay for similar services to
assistants, and still others are paid to turn bridges that have been out of use
for years and nailed up." The association estimated that " at least $25,000 a year
can be easily saved by cutting out the dead wood on this pay roll and paying fair
compensation to men who actually perform the labor where bridges actually
require attention." The association accordingly recommended that all bridge-
tenders be placed under civil service rules. The recommendation, however, was
for many years ignored. Chicago Tribune, December 13, 1905.
CIVIL SERVICE 273
vacancies were to be filled by promotions upon the basis of
ascertained merit, seniority in service, and examination. In
the case of vacancies to be filled by promotion, it was made
the duty of the commission to certify to the appointing author-
ity the names of the three applicants having the highest rating,
from whom alone the appointment might be made. 4 In the
case of original appointment, however, the highest name only
was to be certified, except that, in the case of laborers, the selec-
tion might be made by lot from among those candidates proved
fit by examination. This was an innovation as compared with
previous laws in the national government and in the other
states. An original appointee was placed on probation for a
period of six months, at the end of which time he might be
dismissed with the consent of the commission for reasons as-
signed in writing by his superior officer. In cases where in an
emergency it was impracticable to fill positions from the eligible
list, temporary appointments might be made with the approval
of the commission for a period not exceeding sixty days. This
provision has unfortunately been subject to abuse. The Munici-
pal Voters League, in reporting on aldermen in February, 1916,
declared: "The executive departments of the city government
have for years abused the emergency section of the excellent
and carefully drawn civil service statute. In practice, the chief
use of appointing 'sixty day' men has been to reward political
henchmen with jobs, at the expense of good public service and
to the discouragement of efficient civil service employes." 5
The Chicago Civil Service Reform Association, in a report on
the abuse of the power of temporary appointment, declared
that over thirty thousand temporary permits had been granted
by the city civil service commission during the first year of the
Thompson administration. 6
4 In case the civil service commissioners failed to hold a promotional exami-
nation for the purpose of filling a vacancy in an office in the classified service
they could be compelled by mandamus to do so. People ex rel. <v. Errant et al.,
229 Illinois, 56.
6 Chicago Tribune, February 8, 1916.
6 Ibid., June 22, 1916. This was no new abuse; see for example, ibid., Decem-
ber 24, 1898.
274 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The provision of the act of 1895 regarding removals from
the classified service was also an innovation. A member of
such service might be suspended for a period of thirty days by
his superior officer, but no member could be permanently re-
moved except for cause upon written charges, and with the ap-
proval of the commission. 7 In investigating such charges, the
commission was empowered to administer oaths, subpoena wit-
nesses, and perform other acts of a quasi-judicial body. 8
Among other provisions of the act were those prohibiting
members of the classified service from soliciting, receiving, or
paying political assessments or engaging in partisan activities,
and prohibiting the comptroller or other auditing officer of a
city from approving the payment of compensation to any per-
son holding a position in violation of the provisions of the
law. The act also attempted to make any person convicted
of violating the act ineligible to hold any public office or public
employment for a period of five years, but this disqualification
was subsequently held unconstitutional. 9
There were about fourteen thousand positions in the classi-
fied service of Chicago at the time the law of 1895 went into
effect upon adoption by the voters of that city. The law, how-
ever, did not apply, except potentially, to persons already in
the service but only to vacancies subsequently happening. The
result unfortunately was that there was a tendency to fill the
ranks of the service with members of the party in power, be-
fore the rules of the commission should go into effect. The
restrictions on removals operated, therefore, to protect per-
sons in the service who had been appointed under the old
spoils system. Experience in the working of the civil service
law in Chicago has shown that where the mayor is of the
7 The action of the Chicago commission in removing a police patrolman
might be reviewed on certiorari by the circuit and superior courts of Cook county.
Powell et al. v. Bullis. 221 Illinois, 379.
8 It has been held, however, that this provision does not vest judicial power
in the commission. People ex rel. f. City of Chicago, et al., 234 Illinois, 416.
9 People ex rel. <v. Kipley et al., 171 Illinois, 44 (73-74). In other respects,
however, the supreme court upheld the constitutionality of the act in the Kipley
case.
CIVIL SERVICE 275
spoilsman type, the civil service commission, composed of his
appointees, may become a tool in his hand for the purpose of
building up a political machine ; and the result is that the in-
tent and spirit of the civil service law may be practically nulli-
fied. On the whole, however, the operation of the act has
generally been in the direction of the improvement of the serv-
ice. The more marked immediate effects of the law were to
relieve the mayor and the heads of departments from the pres-
sure of applicants for office, thus leaving them free to attend
to their more important public duties and to relieve city em-
ployees from the burden* of political assessments. 10
The municipal civil service law, in common with the other
civil service laws in the state, has been subjected to various
attacks, in the courts, in the legislature, and in the forum of
public opinion. Some of these attacks have been justified by
demonstrated defects in the working of the law, some have
been inspired by purely political motives, and some by mixed
motives. Among the latter may be mentioned the investiga-
tion by a senatorial committee in 1898 of the operation of the
civil service law in the Chicago police department. This in-
vestigation was probably inspired largely for the purpose of
finding plausible reasons for the enactment of the metropolitan
police board bill, which Governor Tanner wished to have
passed by the legislature at the special session of 18971898
and which provided for a state police board, appointed by the
governor, to control the police department of Chicago. As a
result of its investigation the committee reported that the law
as administered by the city administration was a sham and a
delusion and that a large number of persons had been ap-
pointed to the police force of Chicago, at the suggestion of the
mayor and with the consent of the civil service commission,
whose records showed that they were entirely unfit. The re-
port of the committee was approved by the senate by an almost
10 Report of the Chicago Civil Service Commission, 1896, p. 7. In the impor-
tant case of People ex rel. v. Kipley et at., 171 Illinois, 44, the supreme court in
1897 upheld most of the provisions of the act as constitutional and cleared up
some ambiguities which had arisen in the interpretation of some of its provisions.
276 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
strict party vote. Although colored by party animus it never-
theless disclosed conditions which undoubtedly needed im-
provement. One of the direct results of the investigation was
that more than one hundred policemen, whom the committee
found unfit, were suspended by the civil service commission. 11
Subsequent to the passage of the act of 1895 relating to
cities, the general assembly enacted an amendment to the Cook
county commissioners act which applied the merit system to
about eight hundred positions in the county service.' This
amendment was put into effect without the formality of sub-
mission to a popular referendum. Attempts still further to
amend the Cook county act so as to extend it to more positions
and to make it more effective were made at subsequent sessions
of the general assembly, but with little success. The adminis-
tration of the law fell into disrepute. In 1901 it was declared
that the law was a farce and that successive civil service boards
had violated almost every provision of the law and had made
political appointments to county positions at the behest of ma-
chine bosses. In the same year, the members of the Cook
county civil service commission were indicted by a grand jury,
tried, convicted, and sentenced for malfeasance in office; and
the sentence was sustained by the supr&me court. 12 The par-
ticular charge against them was that they certified applicants
for appointment without the formality of holding open com-
petitive examinations as required by law.
In 1903, an optional act was passed providing for the
introduction of the merit system for positions in the police
and fire departments of the cities having a population of from
seven to one hundred thousand. About eight cities of this
class have adopted the provisions of the act by popular vote.
In each city adopting the act, its provisions are administered
by a board of fire and police commissioners appointed by the
mayor with the consent of the city council. It was provided
in the act that appeals might be taken from the orders of the
11 Chicago Tribune, January 12, 13, 14, 15, February 10, 1898.
12 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 34, section 62 ; Chicago Tribune, February
3, 1901, April 18, 1902.
CIVIL SERVICE 277
board to the circuit court of the county in which the city is
located. This provision, however, was declared unconstitu-
tional by the supreme court, as being a delegation of executive
power to a judicial body. 13
During the first few years of the twentieth century, there
was a growing feeling in favor of the further extension of
civil service reform. Until 1905 the state service was still
largely under the spoils system. The evils of this system were
especially noticeable in the state charitable and corrective in-
stitutions. At the fifth annual meeting of the Illinois State
Conference of Charities held at Champaign in 1900, a resolu-
tion was passed that " this conference unanimously favors the
elimination of partisan political influences from the administra-
tion of the State institutions of Illinois in order that the State
may retain the services of faithful and efficient officers." 14
Conditions, however, continued bad, and when, in 1902, the
secretaryship of the state board of charities was filled by an
appointment made for obviously political reasons, two of the
most prominent and best qualified members of the board
handed in their resignations. 15 In the same year it was stated
by a competent authority that " Illinois probably suffers more
than any other state in the Union from partisan political con-
trol of public institutions. This evil is not chargeable to any
one party nor to any one administration. It has gradually in-
creased until it has become the fashion, not only to change the
administration of state institutions when there is a change of
parties, but even to change their administration with the advent
of a new governor." 16
The ideal in regard to the treatment of inmates of
charitable institutions was gradually changing during the
period from mere segregation to cure. Hence the work was
13 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 24, section 4343; City of Aurora v.
Schoeberlein, 230 Illinois, 496.
14 Chicago Tribune, November 16, 1900.
15 Blair, "Partisan Appointments to Institutions for the Care of the Insane,"
Conference of Charities and Correction, 1902, p. 333.
18 Hart, "Reports from States: Illinois," Conference of Charities and Cor-
rection, 1902, p. 42.
278 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of a delicate nature, requiring skill and scientific training. It
was in such institutions, therefore, that political appointments
were likely to do most damage. Although both political par-
ties declared themselves in 1902 in favor of the reform of the
state service, a bill drawn up by a commission appointed by
Governor Yates to put this reform into effect failed of passage
in the senate after having passed the house. Finally, however,
in 1905, the efforts of the civil service reformers were at least
partially successful. In the legislative session of that year two
bills were reported from committee, one known as the " Com-
prehensive Bill" and the other as the "Half-loaf Bill." The
latter measure finally became a law. The half-hearted way in
which this law was passed is indicated by the failure of the
legislature to make any appropriation for its enforcement, but
Governor Deneen turned over $14,000 from his contingent
fund for this purpose. In general, the law applied the prin-
ciples and provisions of the optional city act of 1895 to the
employees in the state charitable institutions. At the time of
the passage of the act there were seventeen such institutions in
the state and about two thousand employees to whom the act
applied. Members of boards of trustees, superintendents of
institutions, and one chief clerk and stenographer for each in-
stitution were exempted from the operation of the act. The
system was to be administered by a commission of three mem-
bers to be appointed by the governor with the consent of the
senate. The act contained the usual "blanket clause," accord-
ing to which existing employees passed under civil service with-
out examination. The insertion of such clauses constitutes a
temporary concession to the spoils system, but it has been
found to be practically necessary in order to secure the passage
of the act. The law of 1905 confined the privilege of taking
the civil service examinations to citizens of the state, and this
caused some difficulties in the administration of the law. 17 One
result of the operation of the law was the almost entire elimina-
11 Laws of 7905, p. 113; Report of the State Civil Service Commission, 1908,
p. ii ; Report of the Attorney-General, 1908, p. 658.
CIVIL SERVICE 279
tion of the "hospital tramp" who had been in the habit of
drifting from one institution to another. In 1907 the law was
amended so as to give the state civil service commission power
to investigate any removal in the classified service with the
right to reinstate an employee wrongfully discharged. The
probationary period of six months was abolished.
During the years immediately succeeding the act of 1905
there was a growing feeling in favor of extending the civil
service system to the entire state service. This step was
vigorously recommended by the state civil service commission
in its annual reports. It should be mentioned'that, in securing
the passage of the various civil service laws and in maintaining
a general vigilance with regard to civil service matters, much
aid has been derived from the activities of voluntary, unofficial
organizations, such as the Illinois and Chicago civil service
reform leagues. Both in 1906 and 1910 the two principal
political parties declared in favor of the extension of the act.
In the latter year there was submitted to the voters under the
public policy law the question : " Shall the next General As-
sembly extend the merit system by the enactment of a com-
prehensive and adequate state civil service law, thus promoting
efficiency and economy? " This proposition was carried favor-
ably by a majority of 290,000 in a total vote of approximately
530,000. As a result of this unmistakable expression of
opinion on the part of the voters, the legislature in 1911 passed
an amendment to the law of 1905 which extended the merit
system to all appointive positions in the state service with cer-
tain exceptions. The law was not only extended so as to place
under the jurisdiction of the commission about twenty-seven
hundred additional employees, bringing the total up to about
eighty per cent of the entire state service, 18 but also amended
so as to provide that in original as well as in promotional ap-
pointments, only the highest name should be certified; a pro-
bationary period of three months was provided; and im-
18 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 243, section 1-37; Report of the State
Civil Service Commission, 1911, 1:7.
2 8o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
portant changes were made in the provisions concerning
removals.
In its general form, the law of 1911, which, with a few
amendments, still remains upon the statute book, resembles
very closely the optional civil service law for cities enacted in
1895; in fact, most of its provisions are copied almost bodily
from the earlier law, with the necessary changes to make them
applicable to the state service. One of the important features
of the law of 1911 is its rigidity so far as exemptions from
competitive examination are concerned. A blanket clause
brought into the classified service without original examination
all existing employees at the time the act was passed, with the
exception of persons in the exempted classes. All subsequent
applicants for positions in the classified service are subject to
competitive examination, and the state civil service commis-
sion, composed of three persons appointed for six-year terms
by the governor with the consent of the senate, has no power
to classify a position as exempt or noncompetitive or to permit
the appointment of a designated person without examination.
Even laborers may be selected competitively, though, in the
case of laborers the law also allows a selection to be made by
lot from among those candidates proved fit by examination.
Examinations may be conducted by the commission or by per-
sons appointed by it to act as examiners. The examinations are
not necessarily written but may include tests of a practical
character. They are open only to residents of the state, except
that in examinations for technical positions, the residence re-
quirement may be waived.
In certifying the names of eligibles the commission is re-
quired to give preference to Civil War veterans provided they
have the requisite business capacity. By an amendment of
1915 the same preference is extended to veterans of the Span-
ish-American and other wars. In view of the provision of the
constitution prohibiting the general assembly from passing laws
granting special privileges, some doubt was produced as to the
constitutionality of this provision by an opinion of the attorney-
CIVIL SERVICE 281
general; but this doubt has now been dissipated by a decision
of the supreme court. 19
As a result of the rigidity of the law, the public service of
Illinois was, at the time of its enactment, placed more com-
pletely under civil service rules than that of any other state.
The list of the positions in the unclassified service, however, is
rather large: they include all officers elected by the people or
appointed by the governor subject to senate confirmation; all
officers and employees of the general assembly; notaries public,
clerks, and other officers of courts ; persons in the military serv-
ice of the state ; the academic staff of the university and normal
schools; assistants and special attorneys employed by the at-
torney-general; superintendents, wardens, and chaplains of the
state charitable and correctional institutions; one private secre-
tary in each of the elective offices, and in the offices of the presi-
dents of the University of Illinois and the normal schools; and
all clerks and watchmen in the offices of governor, lieutenant
governor, and the elective heads of departments. 20 By an
amendment to the civil service law enacted in 1917 the list of
exempted positions was extended so as to include all law clerks
and special investigators employed by the attorney-general and
all policemen employed in the offices of the elective officers in
the executive department. 21
In providing for promotions, the commission is directed to
note the duties of each office and to fix lines of promotion
where practicable. Whenever a vacancy occurs in a superior
grade, the commission is required to hold a competitive ex-
amination to fill the same, and incumbents of places next lower
in rank are solely eligible for such promotional examination,
unless the commission deems it for the interest of the service
19 Laws of 1915, p. 322 ; Constitution, article iv, section 22 ; Opinions of the
Attorney-General, 1913, p. 21-22; People ex ret. <v. Brady et at., 262 Illinois, 578.
20 The act also placed in the unclassified service one private secretary or
stenographer in the offices of the dean of men and dean of women at the Univer-
sity of Illinois, and provided that students in the university and normal schools
might be employed under the rules of the commission without examination or
certification.
21 Laivs of 1917, p. 290.
282 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
to throw the examination open to the general public. Com-
petition in promotion is not limited to the same department or
institution, but persons of similar grade in all departments may
compete for promotion. The statute makes no specific provi-
sion for transfers within the same grade, but the commission
has at times suggested the transfer of employees from one de-
partment to another; and, in other cases, it has brought about
cooperation in certain lines of work between departments. 22
The provisions of the law relating to removals are dis-
tinctive. Prior to 1917, no person in the classified service, ex-
cept laborers and employees having custody of public funds
for the safe keeping of which another is responsible, was to be
removed except for cause, upon written charges and with an
opportunity to be heard in his defense. All charges were to be
investigated by the civil service commission or its authorized
representatives, and the decision of the commission must be
enforced by the superior or appointing officer. In the holding
of hearings for the investigation of charges, each member of
the commission and any officer appointed by it to investigate
has power to administer oaths and to secure by subpoena the
attendance and testimony of witnesses and the production of
books and papers. " When the commission has proceeded ac-
cording to law and has jurisdiction, its decision is not re-
viewable." 23
Suspensions may be made for a period of thirty days, but
even in the matter of suspensions, the commission may make
an investigation and restore the pay of an employee wrong-
fully discharged. The commission has provided for a local
representative or investigating officer to hear charges in each
place where a public institution is located. The provision that
all appointments both original and promotional are to
be made by selecting the highest name on the eligible list de-
prives the superior officer of all discretion in making an ap-
pointment. Furthermore, as a result of the former restrictions
22 Report of the State Civil Service Commission, 1912-1913, p. 9.
23 Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1913, p. 457.
CIVIL SERVICE 283
upon removals, the discretion of the superior officer to dis-
charge a subordinate was practically eliminated; and while this
might lessen the possibility that the principles of the merit
system would be evaded, it at the same time affected adversely
the disciplinary power of the superior officer over the sub-
ordinates upon whom he was dependent for the performance
of the duties of the office. Doubtless, under present conditions,
some restriction upon the free power of removal is desirable;
but even from the standpoint of the principles of the merit
system, such restrictions may be pushed too far. The principle
upon which civil service laws are based is essentially that of
promoting the general welfare as contradistinguished from the
protection of individual rights. Where restrictions upon re-
moval are so rigid as to prevent the discharge of lax or in-
different employees, such restrictions really operate for the
protection of the individual incumbent of the position rather
than for the public interests. In order to remedy this difficulty,
it has been suggested that it would be sufficient to require that
removals be reported to the civil service commission and
authorize that body to investigate any cases which it deems
necessary, with power to reinstate after investigation, where
conditions warrant such action. 24
Since the making of the above suggestion as to the revi-
sion of the removal provision in the civil service law, the es-
sence of the reform thus recommended has been put into effect
by an amendment to the law enacted by the general assembly in
1917. According to this amendment, it is provided that no
hearing is necessary for removing an employee in the classified
service or for reducing him in rank or pay, but such employee
may be removed or reduced by the appointing officer for any
cause other than political, racial, or religious; and the re-
moval or reduction becomes effective immediately upon the
filing of a statement of the cause in the office of the civil serv-
ice commission. The employee thus removed or reduced, how-
ever, has the right of appealing to the commission, which may
24 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 935-936.
284 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
reinstate him in his former position and direct the payment
of all back salary due him, if, after holding a hearing, the com-
mission finds that the removal or reduction was made for politi-
cal, racial, or religious causes. 25
In its provisions requiring the keeping of efficiency records,
the Illinois law contained, at the time of its enactment, an en-
tirely new feature in state civil service reform. The re-
sponsibility of the state civil service commission does not end
with the certification of a suitable employee to the proper ap-
pointing authority, but it may also follow the employee into
the service and verify or withdraw his certification on the basis
of his record in office. The commission prescribes standards
of efficiency for each grade of employment, and keeps a record
of the relative efficiency of each employee in the classified serv-
ice. Moreover, the activities of the commission are not con-
fined merely to the classified service, but the commission has
been given the additional power to investigate the nature,
tenure, and compensation of all places in the civil service of the
state.
In order to secure the enforcement of the civil service act,
it is provided that all payrolls for the payment of persons in
the classified service shall be certified by the state treasurer
and auditor. It is made unlawful for such officers to be con-
cerned in any way with the payment of a person, unless such
person is holding his position according to law. Any person
who wilfully violates or refuses to obey any provision of the
law or the rules made in pursuance thereof is declared to be
guilty of a misdemeanor, and any public office that such a per-
son may hold is declared vacant upon his conviction.
Shortly after the passage of the act of 1911, a contro-
versy arose between the civil service commission and two state
officers, the secretary of state and the state treasurer, as to the
applicability of the law to certain employees in their offices.
The attorney-general rendered an opinion holding the act un-
constitutional on the ground that the journals of the general
25 Laws of 1917, p. 290-291.
CIVIL SERVICE 285
assembly did not show that amendments to the bill had been
printed as required by the constitution. The matter was car-
ried to the state supreme court, where certain clerks in the
office of the secretary of state sought to compel the state audi-
tor to issue them their salary warrants without the approval of
the civil service commission, and where the constitutionality
of the law was assailed on the ground that it violated the prin-
ciple of separation of powers laid down in the constitution and
that it also violated the provision of the constitution naming
the officers of whom the executive department shall consist and
the provision directing the executive officers to perform such
duties as may be prescribed by law. The court, however, nega-
tived all these contentions and upheld the constitutionality of
the law. 26
At the same session of 1911 at which the state wide civil
service law was passed, the general assembly also passed an act
broadening the Cook county civil service act so as to make it
apply with certain exceptions to the entire county service. The
same provisions were made applicable to any other county upon
reaching a population of one hundred and fifty thousand or
more. 27
At the same time an act was passed putting under the merit
system the employees of the parks of Chicago. Provision was
also made at the same session to extend the Chicago civil serv-
ice law to cover the employees in the municipal courts upon
adoption by popular vote. There was also added to this provi-
sion a clause increasing the salaries of the municipal court
judges. It was partly due to this clause and partly to the feel-
ing that the judges could usually be expected not to make ap-
pointments for purely partisan reasons that the act was de-
feated at the popular referendum in November, 1911, by a
vote of two to one. 28
In 1913, the supreme court declared the county civil serv-
26 Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1913, p. 117; People ex rel. v. McCul-
lough, 254 Illinois, 9 ; see also People v . Brady, 262 Illinois, 578.
27 Hurd's Revised Statutes, 1911, chapter 243, sections 38-72.
28 Ibid,, 73-106; Good Government, 28: 114.
286 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ice act of 1911 unconstitutional on account of the failure of the
journal of either house to show that the conference committee
amendments to one of its sections had ever been printed.* 9
The county commission, however, held that the previous county
civil service law was not affected by the supreme court's deci-
sion. In 1914, all three of the leading political parties in the
state pledged themselves in their platforms to comprehensive
civil service legislation for Cook county. A vigorous effort to
get such legislation through the session of 1915 was made but
failed. The need for such legislation has long been felt.
" For years," it has been said, " the county Civil Service Com-
mission was a sorry joke, a byword and reproach ....
it became a menace to merit and an engine of unscrupulous
politics under a deceptive mask. The law was manipulated
at the bidding of tyrannical bosses and cynical spoilsmen."
The weakness of the county civil service system seems to have
been due in part to the indifference of public opinion and in
part to the power of political executives to appoint and remove
the commissioners for partisan reasons. In order to take the
commissioners out of politics, it has been suggested that they
should be chosen by the same standard of fitness which they
later apply to other applicants for public office. A bill sug-
gested for enactment by the fiftieth general assembly provides
that the commissioners can be removed only after fair trials
by two circuit judges and the county judge. 30 The existence of
three separate and distinct civil service commissioners in Cook
county county, city, and park appears to be an unneces-
sary and cumbrous duplication of machinery; and it has been
suggested that they might well be consolidated into one com-
mission. 31
As noted above, an attempt was made to place the civil
service commissions in cities adopting the act of 1903 under
some sort of superior control by providing that an appeal
29 McAuliffe v. O'Connell, 258 Illinois, 186.
30 Chicago Record-Herald, February 27, 1913; Chicago Herald, November
21, 1916, January 6, 1917.
31 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 937.
CIVIL SERVICE 287
might be taken from the orders of the commission to the circuit
court of the county in which the city is located, but this pro-
vision was declared unconstitutional by the supreme court of
the state. The result of this decision is that the city commis-
sioners are left without any superior state control. The same
is true of city commissions operating under the act o'f 1895.
In order to remedy this condition, the city commissions might
be placed under the administrative supervision of the state
civil service commission. There would seem, however, to be
no good reason why the state commission might not be charged
directly with the administration of the law in the city service of
any city electing to come under the state commission. This
would avoid some of the expense, cumbrousness, and duplica-
tion of machinery of the present system. 32
Under the present civil service system for cities and coun-
ties, the commissions are appointed by the mayor and the presi-
dent of the county board respectively, and the city commission
is also removable by the mayor at his discretion. The result
is that, as has already been noted, if the mayor or president
of the county board is a politician of the spoilsman type, the
civil service commission may be so subject to political influences
that the object of the law is almost entirely defeated. Some
improvement might be brought about by eliminating the re-
quirement that not more than two of the three members of the
commission shall belong to the same political party. The mem-
bers of the board should be selected for fitness irrespective of
party affiliations, and the responsibility for the selection and
for the work of the commission should rest squarely on the
party in power. In the last analysis, however, it is not so much
the machinery as the men in charge and the spirit- actuating
them which determines the manner in which the merit system is
administered.
32 This is similar to the New Jersey plan. A bill permitting cities to adopt
the law in force in Chicago, but containing the provision that the state commis-
sion should have the work of enforcing the law was introduced in the forty-fifth
general assembly by Senator Logan Hay. See Report of the State Civil Service
Commission, 1906-1907, p. 16; Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee,
937-
XIV. THE STATE LEGISLATURE
THE legislature of Illinois, known officially as the general
assembly, and composed of two branches, the senate and
the house of representatives, is, in spite of the restrictions
under which it operates, the most important and powerful
organ of the state government. The senate is composed of
fifty-one members, while the house of representatives is exactly
three times as large. This fact points to the greater dignity
and importance of the position of senator as compared with
that of representative. This inference is further borne out by
the difference in the length of terms, senators serving four-year
terms and representatives, two years. Since only one regular
session is held in each biennium, a representative, elected for
the first time, has but little opportunity of learning the business
and methods of legislation before it is necessary for him to
start his campaign for reelection, if he wishes to continue in
the position, while on the other hand, a senator has a greater
opportunity of acquiring experience in legislative methods and
procedure. In each regular session of the general assembly, at
least half of the senators are "hold-over" members, having
served in the preceding regular session, while, on the other
hand, it is at least possible that every member of the lower
house may never before have served in the general assembly.
This, however, is never actually the case as a certain number
of members of the lower house are in practice always reflected.
Nevertheless, the necessity of biennial elections in the case of
house members may mean that they are more in harmony with
the latest trend of public opinion than are the hold-over
senators. Another difference between the members of the two
houses is the requirement for eligibility that a senator must be
at least twenty-five years of age, while a representative need
288
Vote for Representatives
in the Forty-sixth Gen-
eral Assembly, Novem-
ber 3, 1908
DTwo republicans
One democrat
HTwo democrats
One republican
33 Republicans
24 Democrats
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 289
have attained the age of only twenty-one years. This differ-
ence, however, is in practice of comparatively slight impor-
tance, so that for practical purposes, the principal differences
between the senate and house of representatives are the longer
term and smaller size of the former. If, on account of these
differences the senate is, as a usual rule, perceptibly superior to
the house in legislative ability and experience, the question
might be raised, why not elevate the character of the house by
reducing its size and lengthening the term of its members?
But if the two houses are made identical in these respects,
there would appear to be little reason why one house might
not be abolished. Another difference between the houses, how-
ever, as will be noted later, is the system of cumulative voting
used in electing the lower house, which does not apply to the
senate. Other requirements for eligibility, applying to mem-
bers of both branches, are that they must be citizens of the
United States, residents of the state for five years, and, for
two years next preceding election, residents of the districts
from which they are respectively elected. Disqualifications
for holding a seat in the general assembly consist in holding any
lucrative office under this state, the United States, or any for-
eign government, or being convicted of bribery, perjury, or
other infamous crime, or failure on the part of a collector or
holder of public moneys to make proper accounting therefor.
Members of the general assembly, before entering upon their
official duties, are required to take an oath, administered by a
supreme or circuit court judge, to support the constitution and
faithfully discharge their duties, and stating that they have not
engaged in bribery in securing their seats nor will accept any
bribe to influence their votes. 1 Members of the general assem-
bly may vacate their seats by filing their resignations with the
governor.
Illinois has thus embodied in her fundamental law two
widely practiced principles of American politics, that of local
residence for legislative representatives and that of the separa-
1 Constitution, article IV, sections 3, 4, 5, 15.
29 o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tion of governmental powers. So well grounded in unwritten
law and custom is the practice of requiring local residence for
legislative representatives that it would probably prevail very
largely even in the absence of any constitutional requirement,
but the presence in the general assembly of at least some mem-
bers who represent the state at large and the general interest
rather than local and special interests might be secured by
amending the constitution so as to make no absolute require-
ment of local residence for all members of the general
assembly.
The provision that no member of the general assembly
shall, at the same time, hold any lucrative office under the state
is merely an application of the general principle of separation
of governmental powers stated in the constitution as follows:
" The powers of the government of this state are divided into
three distinct departments the legislative, executive and
judicial; and no person, or collection of persons, being one of
these departments, shall exercise any power properly belong-
ing to either of the others, except as hereinafter expressly
directed or permitted." 2 This prohibition upon the holding
of both legislative and executive position at the same time was
doubtless actuated by a fear of tyranny resulting from too
much concentration of power and from a fear that the gov-
ernor might exercise undue influence over the members of the
general assembly by appointing or refusing to appoint them
to public office. It prevents, however, the introduction in the
state government of the parliamentary form of government
found in certain foreign countries, in which the executive and
legislative authorities are merged. In order to remove this
limitation upon freedom of action in adopting whatever form
of government may be best suited to the needs of the people,
it has been proposed that the constitution be amended so as to
allow the governor to appoint the heads of executive depart-
ments from among the members of the general assembly. 3
2 Constitution, article m; see also Report and Opinions of the Attorney-
General, 1913, p. 363-364; 1915, p. 14.
3 By Senator Logan Hay and others.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 291
For the purpose of electing members of the general assem-
bly, the state is divided into fifty-one senatorial districts, from
each of which one senator and three representatives are
elected. One-half of the senators and all of the representa-
tives are elected in November of the even years. Senators
are elected in the odd and even numbered districts alternately,
beginning with the even numbered districts in 1872. The
constitution requires that the senatorial districts shall be formed
of compact and contiguous territory, bounded by county lines,
and contain as nearly as practicable an equal number of
inhabitants. The constitution further provides that the gen-
eral assembly shall apportion the state every ten years by
dividing the population of the state, as ascertained by the fed-
eral census, by the number fifty-one, and the quotient is the
ratio of representation in the senate. If a county contains not
less than the ratio and three-fourths, it may be divided into
separate districts, and shall be entitled to two senators, and
"to one additional senator for each number of inhabitants
equal to the ratio contained by such counties in excess of twice
the number of said ratio." 4 Cook county is the only county
in the state which has a population sufficient to entitle it to be
divided into senatorial districts. Under the last apportionment
act passed in 1901 it has nineteen senatorial districts or more
than a third of the whole number. Under this apportionment
Peoria, La Salle, and St. Clair counties each constitutes a sep-
arate senatorial district, but all the other senatorial districts,
except those in Cook county, are composed of two or more
counties. Within the districts representatives are elected at
large, and it frequently happens that not only the senator but
all three representatives hail from the most populous county in
the district.
Although the constitution provides that the districts shall
contain as nearly as practicable an equal number of inhabi-
tants, in practice they are sometimes very unequal in that re-
spect. Thus, under the apportionment act of 1901, the
4 Constitution, article iv, section 6.
292 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
twelfth district, in the northwest end of the state, contained
only 78,429 population according to the census of 1900, while
the fiftieth district, in the southern end of the state, contained
a population of 104,019. The ratio of representation, accord-
ing to the population of the state at that census, was 94,540,
so that the twelfth district lacked 16,000 of equalling the ratio,
while the fiftieth district exceeded it by 10,000, making a total
disparity between these districts of 26,000. According to the
census of 1910, the twelfth district contained a population of
775 I 3 while the fiftieth district contained a population of
131,288, so that the disparity had increased to nearly 54,000,
or more than half the ratio of representation. According to
the last federal census, twenty-six districts have a population of
2,497,226, while the remaining twenty-five districts have a
population of 3,141,360. "The result is that 44.3 per cent of
the population controls a majority of the legislature." 5 In
spite of these inequalities and in spite of the constitutional
mandate for a decennial apportionment, no apportionment has
now been made for sixteen years.
The supreme court of Illinois has been rather lenient in
construing the power of the general assembly in making the
apportionment. In the apportionment act of 1893, Lee, De
Kalb, Kendall, and Grundy counties formed the twenty-ninth
senatorial district, while Will, a neighboring county, alone
formed the twenty-fifth district. Had Grundy and Will coun-
ties been joined together as one district, and the other three
counties left together as the twenty-ninth district, both greater
equality in population and compactness of territory would have
been secured. The constitutionality of the act was therefore
attacked in the supreme court, but the court upheld the act
as constitutional. The reasoning of the court was that " an
act apportioning senatorial districts is unconstitutional if it
appears that the constitutional requirements of compactness
of territory and equality in population have been wholly ig-
nored , . but if considered and applied, although to
5 Garner, Legislative Organization and Representation, 60.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 293
a limited extent only .... the act is constitutional,
although the legislature may have imperfectly performed its
duty." "The question whether the constitutional require-
ments .... have been applied at all, is one which
the courts may finally determine; but whether or not the
nearest practicable approximation to perfect compactness and
equality has been attained is -a question for the legislative
discretion." 6
The apportionment act of 1901, though containing the
inequalities already noted, was also upheld as constitutional by
the supreme court. Less than ten years had elapsed since the
previous apportionment act, but the court held that the require-
ment of a decennial apportionment means that the legislature
may make one apportionment, but only one, within each period
of ten years intervening between the taking of the federal
census. The court also made a distinction between the abso-
lute constitutional requirements and those which permit of leg-
islative discretion. The former are that the districts shall be
bounded by county lines except where a county contains suffi-
cient number of inhabitants to make more than one district
that they shall be composed of contiguous territory, and that
no district shall contain less than four-fifths of the senatorial
ratio. The latter are the requirements regarding compactness
of territory and equality of population. " If," said the court,
"the absolute requirements . *' , . have been observed
. . . and there is an approach toward equality in popu-
lation as determined by the ratio, and the districts are in some
degree compact, the court cannot hold the act invalid upon the
ground that a nearer approach toward equality of population
and compactness of territory could have been made." 7 Within
the wide limits of discretion thus allowed the general assembly,
it is possible for that body to gerrymander the state very effec-
tively in the interests of the political party which is, for the
time being, in control of the lawmaking power.
> 6 People ex rel. v. Thompson, 755 Illinois, 451 (452).
7 People ex rel. <v. Carlock, 198 Illinois, 150 (151).
294 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The general assembly also divides the state into districts
for the election of members to congress. Under the last
apportionment act, passed in 1901, the state is divided
into twenty-five districts, from each of which one member
of congress is elected. Under the census of 1910, the
state became entitled to two additional congressmen. Since
no new congressional apportionment has been made, these
two congressmen are now elected at large over the entire
state.
In electing members of the general assembly, one senator
is elected from each of trie fifty-one senatorial districts, and
each voter has one vote in voting for a senator; but three rep-
resentatives are elected from each senatorial district and each
voter has three votes which he may " plump " for one candi-
date or distribute among the candidates for representative in
such manner as he sees fit. This is known as the system of
minority representation or cumulative voting provided for in
the constitution of 1870 and is unique among the methods of
electing legislative representatives found in the various states.
At the time when that constitution was adopted the sectional
feeling between the northern and southern parts of the state
was so strong that almost solid republican delegations were sent
to the legislature from the northern part of the state, while
almost solid democratic delegations were sent from the south-
ern part of the state, with the result that many democrats in
the northern part and many republicans in the southern part
were without representation. The system of minority repre-
sentation was designed to remedy this condition, and it has been
successful in attaining this object. 8 Thus, a study of the matter
made in 1908 showed that in only three instances since 1870
had the principal minority party failed to secure at least one
representative in each district, and third parties also had usu-
ally been able to secure some representation. 9 The represen-
tation secured by minority parties has not, of course, been ex-
8 See map facing p. 288.
9 Moore, History of Cumulative Fating and Minority Representation in Illi-
nois, 93 IF.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 295
actly proportional to their strength, but more nearly so than
would have been possible without the system of minority rep-
resentation.
The sectional issue which brought forth the sytem of minor-
ity representation is no longer so acute as formerly, and the
system must now be judged by certain other more or less un-
foreseen results which have arisen from it. One result has been
the limitation of the number of candidates brought forward by
the two leading political parties. Prior to the enactment of the
direct primary law, the party leaders in caucus or convention
controlled nominations and determined the number of candi-
dates to be nominated. In most districts, the majority party
nominated two candidates and the principal minority party
nominated only one, while in districts which were nearly evenly
divided between the two leading parties, it was a frequent prac-
tice to alternate, one party nominating two candidates at one
biennial election and the other at the next. This " resulted in
members of the legislature being appointed by the extra-legal
government. The electorate has been wholly and palpably dis-
franchised Thus the voter is given no choice
whatever and the nominations are an appointment
Thus the electorate in very many Illinois districts has had com-
paratively little or no real representation in the lower house
for years." 10 At the elections of 19021908 inclusive, the
number of districts in which only three candidates were nomi-
nated by the two leading parties averaged thirty-six, while the
number of districts in which more than three were nominated
averaged fifteen. The influence of the party machine in con-
trolling nominations and elections to the lower house, there-
fore, is very great.
It was expected by some that, with the enactment of the
direct primary election law, the influence of the party machine
would be weakened. The act, however, provides that u the
Senatorial committee of each political party shall meet and by
resolution, fix and determine the number of candidates to be
10 Kales, Un-popular Government in the United States, 166-167, note.
296 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
nominated by their party at the primary for Representative in
the General Assembly." X1 The law has thus left with the
party committee the power of limiting the number of candi-
dates. As a matter of fact, some limitation upon the number of
candidates is essential to the working of the system, since, if
each party nominated three bona fide candidates, the result
would be that normally the majority party in each district
would elect all three of its candidates. Since the enactment of
the primary law, in the elections of 1912 and 1914 the num-
ber of districts in which only three candidates were nominated
has shown a reduction from about thirty to about twenty. But
in 1916, the two major political parties nominated only 181
men to be elected to 153 seats. This, however, has been due
not so much to the primary law, which has disturbed machine
rule very little, as to the growing civic consciousness and the
meteoric career of a strong third party.
It cannot be said that the system of minority representa-
tion has increased the character and ability of the men elected
to the house. It has been observed as a serious objection to
the system that the " assembly chosen under it is apt to be a
heterogeneous body in which no political party has a work-
ing majority, as has not infrequently happened and that the
house is apt to be controlled by a different political party from
that which is in control of the executive department, so that, in
consequence of the lack of harmony between the executive and
the legislature and the lack of a working majority by any
party in the house, the legislative programs of the adminis-
tration are frequently unrealized." 12 On the whole, therefore,
it would seem that the system of minority representation or
cumulative voting should be abolished.
The regular biennial sessions of the general assembly begin
on Wednesday after the first Monday in January of the odd
years, following the November election. Special sessions may
11 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 542.
12 Garner, Legislative Organization and Representation, 69-70.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 297
be called by the governor whenever, in his judgment, re-
quired. 13 Although, in general, each house chooses its own
officers, an exception to this is the fact that the lieutenant
governor, chosen by the people, is the president of the senate.
The lieutenant governor chosen at the November election, how-
ever, cannot be officially declared elected until the general
assembly meeting in the following January has been organ-
ized, for the two houses must meet in joint session to canvass
the vote for state executive offices and declare the result of the
election. 14 Consequently, the lieutenant governor under the
preceding administration, whose term extends until his succes-
sor is elected and qualified presides over the senate until the
new state officers have been duly declared elected and installed
in office. Similarly, the secretary of state in the preceding ad-
ministration presides over the house of representatives until a
temporary presiding officer thereof shall have been chosen.
The presiding officer or speaker of the house is ordinarily
chosen at a caucus of the members of the majority party, but
this unofficial action must, of course, be confirmed by a vote of
a majority of all elected members after the organization of
the house. Permanent organization of the general assembly
in 1913 was delayed three weeks and in 1915 seven weeks
on account of a deadlock over the election of a speaker.
There appears to be no positive provision of law requir-
ing the selection of the speaker from among the mem-
bers elected to the house; but, in practice, he is always a
member. 15
Under the constitution, each house is the judge of the elec-
tion, returns, and qualifications of its members and may there-
fore severally hear and determine contests of election to seats
13 The holding of special sessions considerably increases the public expense,
as, under the constitution, each member receives fifty dollars for incidental ex-
penses for each session, and there is, in addition, the expense of the usually
swollen pay roll of employees. In 1912 there were two simultaneous special ses-
sions.
14 The general assembly by joint ballot also determines the contested elec-
tions for such offices. Constitution, article v, section 4.
15 Ibid., article IV, section 9; Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p.
I44-I4S, 455-456-
298 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
in their respective bodies. 16 The temporary presiding officers
in the two houses during the process of organizing must, since
no committees on credentials are yet chosen, determine tem-
porarily who is entitled to be sworn in and seated as members
of their respective houses. 17 After organization, however,
committees on credentials are constituted for the purpose of
hearing contests for seats. Formerly all expenses connected
with such contests, such as attorneys' fees, et cetera, were borne
by the state, and at nearly every session amounted to thousands
of dollars. Recently, however, a change has been made
whereby the state bears the expenses only of those contestants
who are successful, with the result that the number of con-
tests brought has been greatly reduced. 18 At the close of the
fiftieth general assembly, Governor Lowden by the use of his
veto cut nearly ten thousand dollars from the appropriations
for election contests. His action had the effect of cutting off
all allowances for attorneys and expenses of contestants and
permitting payment by the state only of expenses of members
of subcommittees.
With the exception of the lieutenant governor in the senate,
all officers and employees of the general assembly are chosen
by the respective houses or their presiding officers. These in-
clude secretaries, clerks, chaplains, sergeants-at-arms, door-
keepers, janitors, postmasters, mail carriers, policemen, stenog-
raphers, and pages. None of these employees are under civil
service regulations and the appointments are often made as
rewards for party services. There are undoubtedly, as a rule,
many more legislative employees than are necessary for the
work to be performed. Under an act of the legislature passed
in 1911, the number of house officers and employees was fixed
16 Constitution, article iv, section 9 ; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46,
sections 78, 95. The state canvassing board, composed of state executive officers
in the presence of the governor is empowered to canvass the votes for senators
and representatives and declare the results of the election.
17 Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 457.
18 Thus the appropriations for the contested election expenses at the forty-
eighth general assembly amounted to $65,000, which by the governor's vetoes
was reduced to $57,000, while in the forty-ninth general assembly the total
amount appropriated for this purpose was only about $22,000.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 299
at ninety-one and those of the senate at sixty; but the law is dis-
regarded and the actual number has usually been in excess of
that fixed in the law. This statute, however, is, of course, not
binding upon the legislature. Each employee receives a per
diem which continues throughout the session, irrespective of
the fact that the general assembly is actually sitting on an aver-
age only three or four days a week. The number and cost of
legislative employees reached the high water mark in the forty-
third general assembly, which employed 393 persons, of whom
92 were janitors, at a cost of $i 10,000. At the following gen-
eral assembly, there was a considerable reduction in number
of employees and cost, but in recent years the figures have
tended to rise again. In 1913 a total of 226 employees were
hired at a cost of $97,000 and in 1915 the total number of
legislative employees was 231 and the cost involved was about
$104,000. Where no party has a clear majority in the general
assembly, the number of legislative employees tends to be
larger on account of the supposed necessity of placating the
different factions by distributing among them the control over
the appointment of employees. 19
The constitution of Illinois leaves the amount of the com-
pensation of the members of the general assembly to be de-
termined by that body itself, subject to the limitation that no
change shall be made in the compensation of members during
the term for which they are elected, and that they shall receive
no other allowance or emolument except fifty dollars per ses-
sion for incidental expenses and except also mileage for neces-
sary travel in going to and returning from the seat of govern-
ment. Prior to 1915 the salary of members of the general
assembly was two thousand dollars per biennium, and they
were accustomed to make week-end trips to their home towns
at the expense of the railroads, which granted them passes.
The feeling grew, however, that the members could not accept
19 It should be added that, in the house in 1915 and 1917 and in the senate in
1917, the number of unnecessary employees was greatly reduced. At the ses-
sion of 1911 in Wisconsin, where the legislative employees are under civil service
regulations, the numbers of employees was only 88 and the cost only $50,000.
300
passes from the railroads consistently with independence of
action in performing their legislative duties. Nevertheless,
bills which were introduced at various sessions, to prohibit the
granting and acceptance of passes failed to be enacted into
law. In the session of 1913, provisions for an increase of
legislative salaries and the abolition of railroad passes were
combined in one bill, but it failed of passage. In the same
session, however, the public utilities bill was enacted, one sec-
tion of which prohibited any public utility from granting any
preference or advantage to any corporation or person as to
rates or charges, or in any other respect. In this indirect way,
railroad passes for legislators were abolished. In the session
of 1915, a joint resolution was passed providing that each
member should be allowed mileage for twenty-one round trips
from the capital to his home at the rate of two cents a mile.
The appropriation of $26,000 made under this resolution,
however, was declared invalid by the supreme court in the
Fergus case. At the same session, however, an act was passed
providing that the compensation of members of the general
assembly elected in 1916 and thereafter should be $3,500 per
biennium, which is larger than the salary received by legislators
in most states. Members of the general assembly ordinarily
draw their entire biennial salary in a lump sum immediately
after the organization of the legislature. Payment in quar-
terly installments might, perhaps, be a more satisfactory plan
for several reasons. Heretofore it has been customary for
members who are temporarily seated but whose elections are
subsequently declared invalid to draw the entire pay for the
session in spite of the fact that they had no good claim to it.
This could be prevented in part by quarterly payments. 20
Under the constitution, members of the general assembly
are entitled to certain privileges which do not attach to ordinary
citizens. They are privileged from arrest during the session of
the general assembly and while going to and returning from the
20 Constitution; article iv, section 21; La<ws of 1913, p. 479; Laws of 1915, p.
464, 738 ; Fergus et al. v. Russel et al., 2~o Illinois, 304.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 301
same for all offenses except treason, felony, or breach of the
peace. It is also provided that " for any speech or debate in
either house, they shall not be questioned in any other place."
In other words, they are not liable in damages for slanderous
utterances made in the course of debate. The object of these
provisions is to allow to the members the largest freedom and
independence in the performance of their duties consistent
with the maintenance of the public welfare. For the same rea-
son, members of the general assembly rest under certain disa-
bilities. They cannot receive a civil appointment during their
terms, nor can they be interested in any contract with the state,
nor with any county thereof, authorized by any law passed dur-
ing their respective terms or within one year thereafter. A
member may be expelled by either house by a two-thirds vote
of all the members elected to that house; but if, after expul-
sion, a member is reflected from his district, he cannot be again
expelled for the same offense. 21
The principal business of the general assembly is, of course,
the passage of bills; and in order that this important function
may be carried out in regular and orderly fashion, certain
definite rules of procedure are laid down. These rules are
found partly in the constitution and partly in the body of rules
adopted by each house. The principal constitutional provisions
are as follows : a majority of the members elected to each house
shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of business. A
specific form of enacting clause is provided for all bills, which
may originate in either house, but may be amended or rejected
by the other. On the final passage of all bills, the vote must be
by yeas and nays upon each bill separately and must be entered
upon the journal. In the senate at the request of two members
and in the house at the request of five members, the yeas and
nays shall be taken on any question and entered upon the
journal. That is, the roll is called and each member is
given the opportunity of answering to his name; and the results
are published so that all may know how their representatives
21 Constitution, article IV, sections 9, 14, 15.
302 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
stand on the various propositions brought to a vote. A mem-
ber may, however, endeavor to avoid taking sides on the ques-
tion by declining to vote or by absenting himself from roll
call.
Other constitutional provisions relating to procedure are :
that every bill shall be read at large on three different days, in
each house ; and the bill and all amendments thereto must be
printed before the vote is taken on its final passage. No act
shall embrace more than one subject, and that shall be ex-
pressed in the title. No law shall be revived or amended by
reference to its title only, but the law revived or the section
amended must be inserted at length in the new act. No bill
can become a law without the concurrence of a majority of the
members elected to each house. No act can take effect until
the first day of July next after its passage except in the case
of emergency measures passed by a two-thirds vote in each
house, which may take effect immediately. 22
Within the limits of the above constitutional provisions
each house may adopt such further rules of procedure as it
sees fit. The constitutional rules, of course, cannot be legally
changed by the legislature, but each house may change the
rules of its own adoption at pleasure. A new set of rules
is adopted by each house at the beginning of each session,
but they usually differ little from those of the preceding
session.
As already indicated the presiding officers in the two houses
are the speaker and the lieutenant governor. The speaker is
technically elected by the house. In reality, he is frequently
chosen by the caucus composed of the members of the house
belonging to the majority party. Sometimes the real choice is
pushed one step further back. A small group or coterie of
leading members of the majority party may get together shortly
after the November election and select the candidate of their
party for speaker. This choice is then ratified by the caucus of
the majority members held just before the opening of the next
22 Constitution, section 13.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 303
regular session and later ratified by the whole house. The
speaker is always a party man, and this ordinarily insures a
partisan organization of the house. If no party has a major-
ity or if some members of the majority party refuse to act with
their party caucus, on account of a split in the party over some
question, such as the "wet" and "dry" issue, a deadlock over
the selection of the speaker may occur. This has sometimes
caused the postponement of the election of the speaker and of
the permanent organization of the house for many weeks
after the beginning of the session. Thus, at the beginning of
the forty-ninth general assembly, the speakership fight lasted
seven weeks and the republican candidate was finally elected
through a combination of democrats and republicans. The
similarly long-drawn-out contest in 1913 was doubtless due
partly to the fact that two United States senators were to be
elected and a number of contests were pending, so that the
speaker, in appointing election committees, might determine
the senatorial elections. A speaker chosen as the result of a
bipartisan combination and who is not the choice of his party
caucus is likely to be weaker than one who comes to office with-
out obligation to minority members. This is due to the fact
that the bipartisan combination is ordinarily held together by
an understanding in regard to the distribution of committee
chairmanships, so that the speaker does not have a free hand
in this matter. The candidate for speaker nominated in the
house caucus of the minority party ordinarily becomes the
minority leader on the floor of the house. 23
The selection of the speaker is an important matter on
account of the large powers of that officer. He preserves
order and decorum, directs and controls the officers and em-
ployees of the house, and decides all questions of order, subject
to an appeal to the house, but his decisions are seldom over-
ruled. He recognizes or refuses to recognize members who
desire to speak; he refers bills to the proper committees, he
23 The candidate for president pro tem. of the senate nominated in the senate
caucus of the minority party becomes the minority leader on the floor of the
senate.
appoints the committees, and is himself chairman of the com-
mittee on rules and ex officio member of each committee. 24
The lieutenant governor in the upper house is by no means
so powerful as the speaker. He presides, decides questions
of order, subject to an appeal to the senate, and assigns to the
various senate employees their respective duties. He has no
vote, however, except when the senate is equally divided, nor
does he appoint the senate committees. Technically the senate
committees are appointed by the senate; in reality, they are
appointed by the committee on committees, composed of major-
ity leaders, and itself appointed by the chairman of the senate
caucus of the majority party. The minority candidate for
president pro tern, of the senate, who becomes the minority
leader on the floor of the senate, usually controls the committee
positions assigned to minority members, or occasionally a
minority committee on committees may exercise this power.
In either case, however, the minority assignments are subject
to revision and ratification by the majority committee on com-
mittees. The senate chooses a president pro tern, from its
members to take the place of the lieutenant governor when ab-
sent. He is nominated for the position by the senate caucus
of the majority party. In the senate, the powers correspond-
ing to those exercised by the speaker in the house in controlling
the course of legislation are largely in the hands of the presi-
dent pro tern., the floor leader of the majority party, and a small
coterie of majority leaders, known as the " triumvirate " or the
"big four."
The committee system is an important feature of legislative
procedure. The Illinois legislature has usually had an extraor-
dinarily large number of standing committees of extraordinar-
ily large size as compared with other states. In the forty-
eighth general assembly, the number of standing committees
24 In appointing the minority members of the committees, he ordinarily con-
fers with the leader of the minority party in the house. The democratic state
platform of 1912 declared in favor of the selection of house committees by a
committee on committees instead of by the speaker, but this plan was not carried
into effect.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 305
of the house was sixty-seven and of the senate, fifty-one. In
the house, the appropriations and judiciary committees each
contained forty-four members. Some members of the senate
were on as many as thirty different committees. These condi-
tions were unsatisfactory for the efficient performance of the
duties before the committees. It was impossible for the legis-
lators to attend the meetings of all the committees of which
they were members, and it was often difficult to secure a
quorum for committee meetings. The large size of the com-
mittees rendered them easily subject to the management of a
few leaders and necessitated the performance of much of the
real work by subcommittees. The unusual size to which Illi-
nois legislative committees has grown appears to be due in
large measure to the desire of each member to recognition by
being placed on as many committees as possible. In the senate,
the number of committees seems sometimes to be determined,
not so much by the amount of work to be done, as by the num-
ber of members of the majority party who desire chairman-
ships. 25
In the forty-ninth general assembly, the number of stand-
ing committees was considerably reduced. There were but
thirty-three in the house and twenty-six in the senate. The re-
sult was better attendance on committee meetings and more
careful consideration of bills. 26 This reduction was continued
in the fiftieth general assembly. There is still room for im-
provement, however, in reducing the size of committees and
the number of committees to which each member is assigned.
Ordinarily, the chairman and the majority of the members
of each committee are members of the majority party in the
house, but minority representation on committees is accorded
in a certain proportion. Where no party has a clear majority
in the whole house, as in the forty-eighth general assembly, a
25 In 1915 when no party had a majority and therefore all factions had to
be considered in appointing committees there were fifty-one committees, or
exactly the same as the number of members. Each member was assigned one
committee chairmanship.
26 Legislative Voters League, Assembly Bulletin, July 20, 1916.
3 o6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
bipartisan combination may be. effected, whereby the chair-
manships may be parcelled out among the various parties; and
one party may have the majority of the members of some
committees and the other, of others. Where difficulties are
met in reconciling differences between the two houses over
pending legislation, conference or joint committees may be ap-
pointed to effect a compromise between the opposing views, and
the report of the conference committee is usually adopted as a
matter of course.
Bills may be introduced in either house by any member
or by a standing committee. In the forty-ninth general assem-
bly, nearly a thousand bills were introduced in the house and
over five hundred in the senate. There is usually a qualified
limitation, however, on the time when bills may be introduced.
Thus, under the rules of the fiftieth general assembly, no bill
could be introduced in the senate after May 22, 1917, except
upon motion supported by a majority of the senators present,
while in the house, no bill could be introduced at the expira-
tion of three weeks after the adoption of the permanent rules,
except upon each Tuesday and except by standing committees
of the house. In practice, however, these qualified limitations
may not very greatly reduce the number of bills which would be
introduced after those dates. When bills are introduced, they
are read by title, ordered printed, and referred by the presid-
ing officer to their proper committees. The attitude of a com-
mittee, and especially of its chairman, toward the subject mat-
ter of a bill is very largely the determining factor in the fate
of the bill. If the committee and its chairman, together with
the speaker and the " organization " are in favor of a bill, it is
ordinarily railroaded through on lubricated skids; whereas, if
they are opposed to the bill, it will very likely never again be
heard from after reference to a committee. 27 Thus, in the
forty-ninth general assembly, the omnibus appropriation bill,
27 A graphic account of the various ways in which the progress of a bill may
be advanced or impeded is contained in a bulletin of the Legislative Voters
League of Illinois, reprinted in Reinsch, Readings on American State Govern-
ment, 74-79.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 307
carrying more than fifteen million dollars and containing over
fifty printed pages was introduced into the lower house on June
first, read a second time on June second, and passed on the
third. On the other hand, bills abolishing railroad passes or
designed to improve social and industrial conditions for women
workers have often met such insurmountable obstacles that all
hope of passing them was abandoned.
In order to curtail somewhat the undue power of commit-
tees over the fate of bills, some restrictive provisions have
been included in the rules of each house. Thus, under the
house and senate rules of the fiftieth general assembly, a con-
stitutional majority of the senators or representatives may
recall a bill or resolution from a committee, discharge the com-
mittee from its further consideration and have it placed on the
house calendar. 28 This rule tends to make the house its own
master by enabling a constitutional majority to control the
proceedings. Provision is also made in the rules of the lower
house whereby in the case of measures of general state impor-
tance, the speaker may reserve the bill, with the consent of the
house, to be considered in the committee of the whole house.
If, however, the house fails to consent to such reference, the
bill or resolution must be referred to its appropriate com-
mittee.
The chairman of a committee may, and sometimes has,
attempted to block the consideration of a measure by failing
to call a meeting of his committee ; but, under the house rules,
it is provided that, in such case, fifty per cent of the members
of the committee shall have a right to call a meeting. Prior
to the forty-eighth general assembly no record was kept of
committee meetings. The constitution requires that each house
shall keep a journal of its proceedings, which shall be pub-
lished, but since the really important proceedings and decisions
take place in committee rooms rather than on the floor of the
house, it seems that some record of committee meetings should
28 Except that in the house a bill cannot be recalled from the appropriations
committee.
3 o8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
be preserved, in order that there may be some means of fixing
responsibility for committee action. Consequently, in order
to bring committee meetings under some degree of outside con-
trol, the rules of the house in the forty-eighth general assem-
bly were amended so as to provide that the chairman of each
committee shall keep a record of the time of committee meet-
ings, the attendance of members, names of lobbyists appearing
before the committee, and the vote of each member on all
actions taken by the committee. It was also provided that
every committee hearing should be open to the public and that
the committee record on each bill should be made accessible to
the members of the house and the public during the session, and
should thereafter be filed in the office of the secretary of state.
No provision, however, was made for holding anyone person-
ally responsible for filing the records with the secretary of
state, and this function seems to have been performed either
carelessly or not at all.
Just as the movement to bring the deliberations of the
house under control tends to shift the real procedure to com-
mittees, and just as the movement to control the process of
nominating officers tends to push the real process one step
further back than formerly, so the attempt to bring legislative
committees under outside control may have the effect of caus-
ing the real power to be- transferred to subcommittees or com-
mittees of committees. The large size of committees, as al-
ready noted, also tends in this direction.
As indicated above, bills must, under the constitution be
read at large on three different days. On second reading it is
subject to amendment, but not on third reading. As already
noted, all amendments must be printed before the final pas-
sage, which requires a roll call of yeas and nays and an affirma-
tive vote of a majority of all members elected.
Each house publishes a daily calendar for the use of mem-
bers, containing all special orders of the day and all bills before
the house in their proper order of reading, usually according to
the order in which they were reported. Bills may be advanced
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 309
out of their order, however, by unanimous consent, or by a con-
stitutional majority in the house, or by a majority of those
present in the senate. Subject to the consent of a constitutional
majority in the house and of a majority of those present in the
senate, the house rules committee, of which the speaker is
chairman, and the senate executive committee may report a
special order for the day which shall take the place of the regu-
lar order. These committees, therefore, may become very
powerful in deciding the course of legislation in their respective
houses. There is also sometimes found a steering or sifting
committee which exercises important powers in virtually deter-
mining the fate of bills, particularly toward the close of the
session when the great rush of legislation occurs. Any party,
faction, or group may have a steering committee, either self-
constituted, chosen by its own members, or appointed by the
speaker or by the chairman of the party caucus. The legisla-
tive caucuses and steering committees represent tendencies
toward concentration of party control and responsibility. The
fact that the chairmen of all committees usually belong to the
majority party also tends in the same direction. Party respon-
sibility in the general assembly, however, is not very strong,
and comparatively few of the votes in that body are taken on
strictly party lines. On important issues, however, party cau-
cuses are held to determine party policy, but occasionally some
members of the party refuse to attend or to be bound by the
caucus. It sometimes happens that real control of the course
of legislation is in the hands of a bipartisan combination, com-
posed of the organization members of the two major parties.
Under the rules of each house, means exist whereby debate
may be limited. In order to secure the floor, the member must
be recognized by the presiding officer. Under the house rules
of the fiftieth general assembly, no member may speak longer
than thirty minutes at one time, no more than once on the same
question, except by leave of the house; while, under the senate
rules, no member may speak more than twice on the same ques-
tion, nor longer than fifteen minutes at any one time, without
3 io THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the consent of the senate. Moreover, in each house the previ-
ous question may be ordered, which has the effect of putting
the main question to a vote and of bringing all debate to an
end. Formerly, the legislative debates were not published, ex-
cept in some newspapers, and even there very meagerly or not
at all. Beginning with the forty-ninth general assembly, how-
ever, a daily stenographic record of debates has been taken and
later printed in book form. Each house has a committee to
edit the daily stenographic reports of debate. The principal
advantage of publishing the debates seems to be in operating
as a deterring influence upon members against indulging in un-
seemly or ill-considered remarks.
An attempt to confer upon the executive greater and more
positive control over legislation, as well as to place upon him
the responsibility of having a legislative program, was made
in the forty-eighth general assembly, when a rule was adopted
in the house providing that " when any bill or resolution is in-
troduced for the purpose of carrying into effect any recommen-
dation of the governor, it may by executive message addressed
to the speaker of the house be made an administration meas-
ure," and "may be sent to the appropriate committee or
to committee of the whole house," and, when re-
ported out, " shall have precedence in the consideration of the
house over all other measures except appropriations bills." 29
This rule, however, was little used and has not since been in-
cluded in the rules of the house.
The rules of the legislature are hardly adapted to the most
efficient transaction of business, and it is felt by many legisla-
tors that they might be improved in various respects. It has
been suggested that some means should be adopted to prevent
the great congestion of business during the last few days of the
session, and that there should be such order and deliberation
in the proceedings as to deprive members of any excuse for
voting blindly and without sufficient consideration on impor-
29 House Journal, 1913, 315; Hull, "Legislative Procedure," American
Political Science Review, 7:239-241.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 311
tant measures. At the expiration of a certain time, if a bill has
not been acted upon by a committee, it should automatically
come out and be placed on the calendar. The introduction of
bills "by request" should be prohibited so that each member
may take the responsibility for his own bills. 30 In a legislative
body where there are many new members, it is almost inevi-
table that large powers over the course of legislation should
gravitate into the hands of a small group of leaders. Some
means should be adopted, however, whereby such large powers
may rest in the hands of those who can be held effectually re-
sponsible for their proper exercise.
Even though the rules, however, were perfected so as to
be entirely unobjectionable, it still remains true that there
would be no assurance that the rules would be observed if it
should be to the interest of the various factions and members
generally to disregard them. The rules may at all times be sus-
pended by unanimous consent, and this is the common way of
conducting house business. It often happens that, even though
a member may disapprove of the irregularity of the proceed-
ings, he hesitates to raise an objection and thereby endanger
his usefulness as a legislator by rendering himself obnoxious to
the leaders and other members whose consent he must obtain in
order to get his own measures through. When the irregularity
of the proceedings becomes so flagrant, however, that a mem-
ber or members raise objections, their objection may be ignored
if the presiding officer and the "organization" are determined
to brook no opposition, and the measure may be declared car-
ried by " gavel rule." One of the most notorious attempts
to gavel through a measure occurred in 1903, when the speaker
ignored repeated cries for a roll call during the fight over
the traction bill and was finally forced to leave his chair by the
rush of indignant members. A resolution protesting against
the conduct of the speaker was unanimously adopted at a meet-
ing of ninety-seven house members and ordered spread upon
the journal. The preamble of the resolution recited that " The
30 Legislative Voters League, Assembly Bulletin, November 20, 1914.
312
Speaker of this House has by revolutionary and unconstitu-
tional methods, denied a hearing in this House or a roll call
constitutionally demanded upon measures of grave importance,
and has attempted by the same methods to force the same be-
yond the point where they can be amended or calmly considered
by this House upon their merits." 31 This public condemna-
tion of the speaker's course has not, however, had the effect of
eliminating gavel rule altogether. Such methods, when de-
signed merely to prevent the dilatory tactics of the minority,
are not objectionable, but when used to deprive either the ma-
jority or the minority of their constitutional rights, are highly
censurable. 32
Although the houses cannot be compelled by any outside
authority to observe their own rules, the disregard of rules of
legislative procedure laid down in the constitution rests upon
a somewhat different basis. Where the journal does not show
that all amendments to a bill have been printed before its final
passage, as required by the constitution, and the question as to
whether the bill was properly passed is raised in the courts,
the validity of the act will not be sustained. A statute which
bears the signatures of the presiding officers of both houses
and of the governor will be presumed to have become a law
pursuant to the requirements of the constitution; but this pre-
sumption will be overcome if the journal fails to show that the
act was passed in the mode prescribed by the constitution. 33
It sometimes happens, however, that constitutional require-
ments are disregarded by unanimous consent, and the question
of the validity of the passage of the bill is never raised in the
courts. A constitutional requirement which is often waived by
31 House Journal, 1903, 833.
32 Another example of gavel rule recurred in 1913 when the speaker refused
to grant a roll call when demanded by the number required by the constitution,
and gavelled through a resolution providing for the appointment of a number
of additional legislative employees.
83 Neiberger <v. McCullough, 253 Illinois, 312; People ex rel. v. Bowman
247 Illinois, 276; People <v. McWeeney et al., 259 Illinois, 161 ; McAuliffe v.
O'Connell, 258 Illinois, 186; People ex rel. <v. Brady, 262 Illinois, 578; People
ex rel. v. Knopf, 198 Illinois, 340; Chicago Telephone Company v. Northwestern
Telephone Company, 199 Illinois, 324; Lynch v. Hutchinson, 219 Illinois, 193;
Illinois Central Railroad Company <v. People, 143 Illinois, 434.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 313
unanimous consent is that which provides that " every bill shall
be read at large on three different days." To comply literally
with this requirement would consume so much time that little
progress could be made. Few, if any, members of the legisla-
ture would be inclined to insist on literal compliance with this
provision in the case of such a bill as the Gilbert court practice
bill in the forty-seventh general assembly, which contained
fifteen hundred printed pages and was calculated to require
about sixty-five hours to read in full. Moreover, even though
constitutional requirements are not actually complied with and
the question of the validity of the act is raised in the courts, if
the official journal does not disclose on its face any irregularity
in the proceedings, the courts will ordinarily not go behind the
face of the official record. Inasmuch as the proceedings are
recorded by the clerk in accordance with the decisions of the
presiding officer, it may result as has been said, that " what the
Speaker declares the clerk must record, and what the clerk
records no court will set aside." 34
The powers of the legislature are much broader than those
of either the executive or judicial branches of the government.
In general, the legislature may pass any law and do any legis-
lative act not prohibited by the constitution of the state or of
the United States. 35 There are, however, numerous limita-
tions on the legislature in the state constitution. The due
process clause of the constitution has within recent years oper-
ated as a serious limitation on the legislature in attempting to
bring under legal regulation many of the economic phenomena
of the new industrial age. In particular there is a stringent
prohibition placed on the legislature against the passage of
local or special laws in any of twenty-three enumerated cases,
and a general prohibition against the passage of such laws in
all other cases in which a general law can be made applicable. 36
As to the enumerated subjects, the prohibition against special
34 Reinsch, Readings on American State Government, 75.
35 People ex rel. <v. McCullough, 254 Illinois, 9. At a special session, how-
ever, the powers of the legislature are limited by the call of the governor.
30 Constitution, article iv, section 22.
3H THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
legislation is absolute, but the provision that no special law
shall be enacted where a general law can be made applicable
is directory and not mandatory, and the action of the general
assembly in such case is not subject to review by the courts. 37
Prior to 1904, the general assembly found itself impeded by
the constitutional prohibition against special legislation in
adapting laws to the different conditions found in Chicago as
compared with the rest of the state. By a constitutional
amendment adopted in that year, however, the legislature may
pass special acts relating to the government of the city of Chi-
cago, which, however, can go into effect only when ratified by
the voters of that city. 38
Under the constitution the general assembly is prohibited
from appointing or electing any public officer, and since 1913
it has been debarred from choosing United States senators.
This is fortunate, as the election of senators often greatly inter-
fered with the regular work of the legislature, as in the case of
the deadlock of 1913, which was ended by a bipartisan com-
bination which sent a republican and a democrat to the senate.
The senate, however, has the important power of confirming
most of the governor's appointments to office. This power
tends to divide the responsibility for the appointment between
the governor and the senate and, if abolished, would enable
the senate to apply itself solely to its strictly legislative func-
tions. Any civil officer of the state may be removed from
office through the process of impeachment, in which the accu-
sation is made by a majority of the house of representatives
and the case is tried by the senate. A two-thirds vote of all the
senators elected is necessary for conviction, which operates to
remove the officer from office and to disqualify him from hold-
ing any official position under the state government. 39
Each house may punish by imprisonment any person, not a
37 Wilson <v. Board of Trustees el al, 133 Illinois, 443 (446); Knopf v.
People ex rel., 185 Illinois, 20; Owners of Lands <v. People ex rel., 113 Illinois
296 (315)-
38 Constitution, article iv, section 34.
39 Ibid., sections 10, 24.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 315
member, who Is guilty of disrespectful behavior to the house in
its presence. Any person may be compelled by subpoena to
appear and give testimony as a witness and produce papers and
documents before either house, or a committee thereof, or a
joint committee of both houses. 40
Methods of legislation in the general assembly as effecting
the character of the output seem to indicate the need for
greater system and more concentrated responsibility. This is
shown by the fact that not infrequently conflicting measures re-
lating to the same subject are passed at the same session. Thus,
in the forty-seventh general assembly, two acts were passed,
the state civil service law and the state mining law, which con-
tained provisions relative to the appointment of state mine in-
spectors which were in plain and irreconcilable conflict. 41 The
quantity of legislation put out by the general assembly is more
imposing than its quality. The fiftieth general assembly passed
407 bills, of which Governor Lowden signed 225, vetoed 69,
and permitted 1 13 to become laws without his signature. The
session laws of the fiftieth general assembly require for pub-
lication a volume of over eight hundred pages.
The scramble, haste, and confusion amid which bills are
amended, reported, passed, sent to conference, and repassed,
especially in the closing hours of a session, are responsible for
the passage of much ill-considered legislation as well as for the
killing or smothering of many meritorious bills. It is par-
ticularly in the field of financial legislation that more systematic
methods and concentrated responsibility seem desirable. Total
appropriations in recent years have mounted at a rapid rate.
In 1905, the biennial appropriations were only about sixteen
million dollars while ten years later they had increased to about
forty-six million dollars and in 1917 they amounted to more
than fifty million dollars. This rapid increase in the expense
* Constitution, article IV, section 9 ; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 63, sec-
tion 6; Report and Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1913, p. 351-353.
41 Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. 1073. For additional instances of
confusing and contradictory legislation see the annual address of President Ham-
line, Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar Association, 1897, part 2, p. 3-5.
3 i6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of running the state government has naturally drawn attention
to the unsystematic and haphazard method of financial legis-
lation and caused a movement toward bringing about an im-
provement in this direction. Evidence of the lack of, and need
for more systematic methods in financial legislation is found in
the amount of deficiency appropriations passed in each general
assembly, which increased from about $133,000 in the forty-
seventh, to about $400,000 in the forty-ninth general assem-
bly. Much money also is wasted in making appropriations to
pay claims for private relief, which, in some cases, had been
denied by the court of claims. The constitutionality of defi-
ciency and private appropriations is somewhat questionable.
In the forty-eighth general assembly there were ninety-four
separate appropriation acts, and two years later there were
eighty-eight, containing hundreds of detailed items. Most of
these bills were reported from committee and passed near the
close of the session when any adequate consideration of them
was practically impossible. Under the constitution, appropria-
tions for salaries of state officers must be in a separate bill, but
all other appropriations might be combined in one or a few
measures. 42 Greater uniformity in the classification of items
would facilitate comparison between different institutions and
different fiscal periods.
In making appropriations for state institutions and depart-
ments the legislature has heretofore derived the information
upon which the appropriations were based largely from the
estimates of needs made by the heads of the respective depart-
ments or institutions. 43 The total estimates, therefore, were
the result of no state wide plan. It has been customary, it is
true, for committees of legislators to be appointed to visit the
various state institutions with the ostensible purpose of inquir-
ing into their financial needs, but such visiting committees sel-
dom succeed in eliciting information of any real value and, in
42 Legislative Voters League, Assembly Bulletin, March 9, 1916; Constitu-
tion, article IV, section 16.
43 These remarks, however, are not applicable to the charitable institutions
since the creation of the board of administration in 1910.
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 317
some cases, seem to have degenerated into legislative junkets.
The real work of investigating the financial needs of the insti-
tutions, so far as done at all, has usually been done by subcom-
mittees of the appropriations committees. Even though the
legislature did its full duty to the best of its ability, it is not as
well suited as the head of the executive department to originate
the state wide financial program. 44
With a view of bringing about some improvement in the
methods of financial legislation and of creating a permanent
agency to assist the legislature in this respect, the joint legis-
lative reference bureau was created in 1913. This consists of
the governor and the chairman of the appropriations and
judiciary committees of the two houses, with a salaried secre-
tary. 45 One of the duties vested by the act in the bureau was
to prepare for the use of the general assembly a detailed budget
of appropriations for the several state departments for the
succeeding biennium compiled from the statements of financial
needs made by the several departments. This was a step in the
right direction, but in several respects it fell short of what is
needed. No provision was made for a statement of estimated
revenues, and no authority was granted to the bureau to make
any responsible recommendations in regard to the estimates.
The consolidation act of 1917 did not abolish the legislative
reference bureau, but it provided for the submission by the gov-
ernor of a budget to the general assembly containing the recom-
mendations made by him on his official authority as to appropri-
ations for the various state departments and institutions. Al-
though such a budget naturally carries more weight than one
submitted without recommendation by the legislative refer-
ence bureau, the general assembly is, of course, not legally com-
pelled to follow it or to give it any consideration.
Other functions conferred upon the legislative reference
bureau were to supply information for the use of the general
44 Legislative Voters League, Assembly Bulletin, November 17, 1915; Pro-
posed Legislative Measures to Carry into Effect tfre Recommendations of the
Efficiency and Economy Committee, 1915, p. 28.
45 Laws of 1913, P- 391.
3 i8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
assembly and to assist any member thereof in the drafting of
any bills or resolutions which he may desire to introduce. Such
assistance, if rendered by competent draftsmen, should be of
considerable value, especially to new members, unskilled in the
technical legal requirements of bill-drafting.
The forces influencing legislation in Illinois, as in most
other states, are of a mixed character, sometimes sinister,
sometimes public-spirited. Professional lobbyists representing
powerful special interests are often very numerous and active,
but are probably less numerous and influential at present than a
few years ago. The withdrawal from the legislature of the
power of electing United States senators operates to remove
one important source of possible corruption, such as was
alleged to have occurred in 1909 in the election of William
Lorimer. In order to prevent lobbying from being carried on
upon the floor of the legislative body, each house has adopted
rules restricting the access to the floor of any person, with the
exception of certain privileged classes not acting as attorneys
for persons or corporations interested in pending legislation.
In 1915, Governor Dunne sent a special message to the gen-
eral assembly denouncing the corrupt lobbyist and advocated
the passage of a law or resolution requiring registration of
lobbyists. Such a resolution was passed in the senate but was
not enforced.
Although professional lobbyists usually exercise a perni-
cious influence on legislation, it is of course true that lobbying
of a certain kind is perfectly legitimate. On important bills,
the general assembly frequently holds public hearings and at
such hearings it is entirely proper for any citizen to appear and
present his views on pending legislation. Much legislation of
the present day relates to technical matters, about which no
member of the general assembly may be as well informed as
certain persons on the outside. Representatives of the Citi-
zens' Association of Chicago, the Chicago Civic Federation,
the Chicago and Illinois state bar associations, the Illinois
Commission on Uniform Laws, and various other voluntary
THE STATE LEGISLATURE 319
agencies active in proposing changes in the laws, have through
bringing their influence to bear on the general assembly, been
of great value in improving the character of the legislative
output 46 The Legislative Voters League has been of great
service in exposing legislative methods to public view and in
publishing the records of legislators for the information of
voters.
It is doubtless true that, within recent decades, the con-
fidence of the people in the general assembly has been at a low
ebb, as indicated by the numerous limitations placed on the
legislature in the present constitution. Many incidents and
much legislation may also be cited which seem, at first sight, to
justify this lack of confidence. Such instances, however, should
not be allowed to blind the people of the state to the really
good and substantial work which the legislature has accom-
plished in many lines in spite of the very considerable difficul-
ties under which it operates. The release of the legislature
from such difficulties and restrictions would probably enable
it to do still better work.
48 Cf. MacChesney, " A Legislative Programme for Law Reform," Illinois
Laiv Review, 3: 512-521.
XV. THE STATE JUDICIARY
JUDICIAL power has been defined by the supreme court of
Illinois as " that power which adjudicates upon and pro-
tects the rights and interests of individual citizens, and to that
end construes and applies the laws." x Although power of a
quasi-judicial nature may be exercised to some extent by the
legislative, executive, or administrative organs of the state
government, judicial powers, properly speaking, are vested
in the main in such judicial tribunals as are provided for by the
constitution or created by law in and for cities and incorporated
towns. 2 Thus the power of the legislature in establishing
courts is strictly limited. The state is provided by the consti-
tution with a hierarchy of courts, comprising the supreme court,
the appellate courts, and the circuit courts. In addition, there
are numerous local courts, such as county courts, city courts,
justices of the peace, and police magistrates, and certain special
courts, such as probate courts and the court of claims.
At the apex of the system stands the supreme court, which
is organized upon the collegial principle. There are seven
judges, elected by popular suffrage for nine-year terms. In
order to be legally eligible for the position, each judge must
be at least thirty years of age, a citizen of the United States,
a resident of the state for five years next preceding his elec-
tion, and a resident of the district in which he is elected. 3 In
practice, supreme court judges must, of course, be learned in
the law and frequently stand among the leaders of their pro-
fession. Under the original constitution of 1818, the justices
of the supreme court, as well as the judges of the inferior
1 People ex rel. v. Chase, 165 Illinois, 527; Witter v. County Commissioners
of Cook County, 256 Illinois, 616.
2 Constitution, article vi, section i.
8 Ibid., 'article VI, section 3.
320
THE STATE JUDICIARY 321
courts, were appointed by joint ballot of both branches of the
general assembly and held their offices during good behavior.
Since 1848, however, they have been elected by popular vote
for definite terms of office. For the purpose of electing the
supreme court judges, the state is divided into seven districts,
each containing several counties. The boundaries of the dis-
tricts may be changed by the general assembly at the session
next preceding the election of judges therein, provided such
alterations are made upon the rule of equality of population,
as nearly as county boundaries will allow, and provided that the
districts shall be composed of contiguous counties, in as nearly
compact form as circumstances will permit, and provided fur-
ther that the alteration of the districts shall not affect the tenure
of office of any judge. The counties composing the districts
were originally laid down in the constitution ; but, on account of
the unequal growth of population in the various districts, some
alterations in the boundaries were made in 1903 by the gen-
eral assembly. The constitution apparently intends that the
division of the state into supreme court districts shall be based
upon the principle of approximately equal population. If so,
the actual division has become archaic, since the seventh dis-
trict, in which Chicago is located, contains nearly one-half the
population of the state and an even larger percentage of the
cases in the supreme court come from that district, yet the
people of that district elect only one-seventh of the members
of the court. It would seem that the division into districts
should be made more equitable, or else the district system
should be abandoned and the supreme court justices all elected
on a general ticket. 4
The election for judges of the supreme court are held in
the separate districts and take place on the first Monday in
June in such years as vacancies regularly occur. The judicial
election was placed at a time different from that of executive
officers and members of the general assembly in order to mini-
4 Ibid., article vi, section 5; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37, section la,
ib, which were held constitutional in People ex rel. <v. Rose, 203 Illinois, 46.
322 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
mize the influence of political considerations in the selection of
the judges. Five of the supreme court judges are elected every
ninth year, as in 1915, 1924, et cetera, while the other two
judges are elected at intervals between these dates, so that ordi-
narily, there are always at least two judges with previous ex-
perience on the supreme court bench. Moreover, supreme
court judges are not infrequently elected to succeed themselves
upon the expiration of their terms. In case of a vacancy occur-
ring through death, resignation, or incapacity, prior to the
expiration of the term of any judge, a special election is held
in the district to fill such vacancy, unless the unexpired portion
of the term does not exceed one year, in which case the vacancy
is filled by appointment by the governor. 5
Prior to 1897, the supreme court was held in three grand
divisions, denominated the southern, central, and northern;
and sessions were held for these divisions in three separate
places, Springfield, Ottawa, and Mt. Vernon. There were
very decided disadvantages in this division of the court. The
judges, not having adequate opportunities for consultation and
discussion, sometimes handed down inadequately considered
opinions. 6 The demand for the consolidation of the court
grew more insistent, until, in 1897, the court was consolidated
by act of the general assembly, and since then the sessions of
the court have been held in Springfield, beginning on the first
Tuesday in October, December, February, April, and June
of each year. It is not necessary that all the seven judges shall
hear every case argued; a majority of them, constituting a
quorum, is competent to sit and to render decisions. The
court is presided over by a chief justice, who is nominally se-
lected by the justices from among themselves. Under the
present rules of the court, no justice is eligible to serve as chief
who has not served as a justice at least two years. Among
those who are eligible, justices who have not served before as
chief are preferred; and among the latter, seniority, as de-
6 Constitution, article VI, section 32.
6 Chicago Tribune, April 3, 1897.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 323
termined by length of continuous service, shall control. If all
the eligible justices have before served as chief, then that jus-
tice succeeds whose last term as chief is most remote in point
of time. 7
The clerk of the supreme court, strangely enough, is not
chosen by the court but, since 1 848, has been elected by popular
vote, in accordance with the general tendency toward an un-
duly long ballot. It may be noticed, in passing, that it is a gen-
eral rule in Illinois to elect clerks of courts of record by popu-
lar vote. This renders them subject neither to administrative
control nor to judicial control. Neither are they subject to
popular control in spite of popular election, because a clerk of
court is too inconspicuous and too much of a ministerial officer
to secure much attention from the voters.
The supreme court, however, appoints its own reporter
who edits and publishes the opinions of the court, and its own
marshal, who attends upon the sittings of the court and per-
forms such other duties, under the order and direction of the
court as are usually performed by sheriffs of courts. The
court also promulgates its own rules of practice, subject to the
provisions of the constitution and acts of the general assembly.
The salaries of the supreme court justices are fixed by the gen-
eral assembly at $10,000 per annum, but may not be increased
or diminished during the terms for which such justices are
elected. The supreme court justices are prohibited from re-
ceiving any other compensation, fee, or perquisite, and from
performing any other than judicial duties to which may belong
any emoluments. 8
Next below the supreme court stand the appellate courts.
In accordance with constitutional authorization, the general
assembly in 1877 divided the state into four appellate court
districts, of which Cook county comprised one district and the
7 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37, sections 2, 3. On the movement for
the consolidation of the supreme court, see J. H. Hamline in Proceedings of the
Illinois State Bar Association, 1897, part 2, p. 31-35; 1898, part 2, p. 6; Rules
of Practice of the Supreme Court of Illinois, number 38.
8 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37, sections u, 12; Constitution, article VI,
sections 7, 16.
324 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
other three corresponded, in the main, to the three grand divi-
sions of the supreme court, as they existed prior to 1897. No
special appellate court judges are provided, but each appellate
court is held by three circuit court judges assigned to duty in
such appellate court for three-year terms by the supreme court.
The three circuit court judges assigned to each appellate court
choose one of their number to be the presiding justice of the
appellate court in that district. The four appellate courts hold
their sessions in Chicago, Ottawa, Springfield, and Mt. Vernon
respectively. Provision is made in the law for the erection of
branch appellate courts in any district in which the number of
cases pending before the appellate court shall exceed two hun-
dred and fifty. In pursuance of this authorization, two branch
appellate courts have been erected in the Cook county dis-
trict. In that district, superior court judges as well as circuit
court judges are assigned to duty in the appellate court and its
branches. In each of the other three districts, it is customary
to assign no more than one circuit court judge from a given
circuit to duty in the appellate court. The circuit court judges
assigned to a given appellate court district, outside of the Cook
county district, are not usually, or necessarily, drawn from a
circuit composed of counties contained in such appellate court
district. A circuit court judge, when sitting in the appellate
court, is prohibited from passing upon any case previously de-
cided by him in the circuit court. It is considered an honor for
a circuit court judge to be selected to sit in the appellate court;
but, for this service, he is not allowed to receive any addi-
tional compensation. 9
As the amount of judicial business in the state increases,
the importance of the appellate courts is correspondingly en-
hanced. The certiorari law of 1909 further enlarged the im-
portance of these courts; and as the work of the supreme court
becomes greater, there is an increasing tendency to give to the
appellate courts more final jurisdiction, in order to relieve the
9 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37, sections 35C, 3$k; Constitution, article
VI, section n.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 325
congestion in the supreme court. These considerations raise
the question whether the appellate courts should be provided
with judges of their own. To do this the constitution would
have to be amended so as to provide for the selection of appel-
late court judges either by popular vote or by appointment by
the supreme court from among members of the bar. Such a
change would relieve circuit court judges from appellate court
duty and would tend to develop greater expertness in appellate
court work among the judges of the latter court. 10
The court of general original jurisdiction in Illinois is the
circuit court, which stands next below the appellate courts. By
act of the general assembly, the state has been divided into
eighteen judicial circuits, of which Cook county is one, and
each of the others is composed of three or more counties. In
making such division into circuits, the general assembly rests
under the limitations that outside of Cook county " such cir-
cuits shall be formed of contiguous counties, in as nearly com-
pact form and as nearly equal as circumstances will permit,
having due regard to business, territory and population." n
New circuits may be formed and the boundaries changed by
the general assembly at its session next preceding the election
for circuit judges, subject to the foregoing limitations, and to
the condition that the tenure of office of no judge shall be
thereby affected. 12
In each of the seventeen circuits outside of Cook county
three circuit court judges are elected by the people on a general
ticket for six-year terms. The elections are held regularly on
the first Monday in June of each sixth year, as in 1915, 1921,
et cetera, but special elections may be held at other times to fill
vacancies occurring more than a year before the expiration of
the term. In order to be eligible to a circuit judgeship, the
candidate must be at least twenty-five years old, a citizen of
_ 10 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter no, sections 121, 122; see also Freitag <v.
Union Stock Yard and Transit Company, 262 Illinois, 551 (552-553) ; Courier <v.
Simpson Construction Company, 264 Illinois, 488 ; Illinois Law Review, 3 : 94.
11 Constitution, article vi, sections 12, 13; Frackelton <v. Masters, 249 Illinois,
30; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37, section 73.
12 Ibid., article VI, section 13.
326
the United States, a resident of the state for five years next
preceding his election, and of the district in which he is elected.
The compensation of a circuit court judge is $5,000 per annum,
which is fixed by the general assembly but cannot be increased
or diminished during his term of office. Like the supreme
court justices he is prohibited from receiving any other emolu-
ment. The circuit courts are empowered to make their own
rules for the disposition of business before them, not incon-
sistent with law. 13
Although there are three circuit court judges in each cir-
cuit, it is contemplated by the law that the circuit court shall
be held by but one judge, so that three circuit courts may be
held simultaneously in the several counties composing a circuit.
Two or more regular terms of circuit court are held annually
in each county of the circuit. The times for the beginning of
such regular terms are specified in the law, but special terms
may be held at the discretion of the judges. The distribution
of the work among the judges of a circuit is arranged by the
judges among themselves, but the supreme court may assign
judges from circuits where the business is light to hold court in
other circuits where the dockets are congested. 14
In each county of the state there is a county court, with a
single county judge, elected by popular vote for a four-year
term. The county court has limited jurisdiction in civil and
criminal cases, exercises certain administrative functions in con-
nection with election and taxation matters and possesses juris-
diction in probate matters, except in counties having a popula-
tion of more than 70,000 in which separate probate courts
have been established, with probate judges elected for four-
year terms. The county and probate judges are not elected at
separate judicial elections, but on Tuesday after the first Mon-
day in November of every fourth year, as in 1914, 1918, et
cetera, when certain political officers are also chosen. A clerk
of the probate court is elected at the same time and for the
13 Constitution, article vi, sections 16, 17. The Cook county judges receive
additional compensation from the county. Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37,
section 69.
14 Ibid., chapter 37, section 82 i.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 327
same term as the probate judge. The county clerk acts as clerk
of the county court 15
In addition to the above courts of record, provision is made
for the establishment of city courts of record and for justices
of the peace and police magistrates who do not hold courts of
record. City courts, which may be established in any city con-
taining at least 3,000 inhabitants when an ordinance to that
effect is submitted by the city council and adopted by a two-
thirds vote of the people, have concurrent jurisdiction with cir-
cuit courts in civil and criminal cases arising in the city and
entertain appeals from the justices of the peace in such city.
City courts have now been established in about twenty-five cities
of the state. The judges of city courts must be regularly
licensed attorneys and are elected in the same manner as the
city officers are elected, but not at the same time. Justices of
the peace and police magistrates, outside of Chicago, hear petty
causes, involving lesser offenses or small amounts of money. 10
Justices of the peace and police magistrates are elected in town-
ships and villages for four-year terms.
In Cook county and Chicago, on account of the greater
amount of litigation and judicial business, the organization of
the courts, except in the case of the county and probate courts,
is more complicated than in other parts of the state. The work
performed by the circuit court in other parts of the state is in
Cook county divided between the circuit, superior, and criminal
courts. There are twenty judges in each of the circuit and
superior courts, who are elected by popular vote for six-year
terms. Under the constitution, the number of judges in these
courts may be increased by the general assembly from time to
time in accordance with the growth of population in the county.
In each of these courts the judge having the shortest unexpired
term is the chief justice of the court. The circuit and superior
courts of Cook county have concurrent jurisdiction in civil
cases such as may be brought in the other circuit courts of the
15 Ibid., chapter 37, sections 216 ff.
16 Laws of 1917, p. 328; Herman <v. Commissioners of Highways of Pitman
Township, 797 Illinois, 94.
328 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
state. The criminal court of Cook county has jurisdiction in
criminal and quasi-criminal cases, concurrently with the circuit
court. It has no special judges of its own, but the judges of the
circuit and superior courts are ex officio judges of the criminal
court. 17
By a constitutional amendment adopted in 1904, it was
provided that " in case the General Assembly shall create
municipal courts in the city of Chicago it may abolish the offices
of justices of the peace, police magistrates and constables in
and for the territory within said city .... and in such
case the jurisdiction and practice of said municipal courts shall
be such as the General Assembly shall prescribe." 18 In ac-
cordance with this constitutional authorization, the general
assembly passed the municipal court act of 1905, whereby the
offices of justices of the peace, police magistrate, and con-
stable were abolished in Chicago; and in their place a court of
record was established, known as the municipal court of Chi-
cago. This court consists of one chief justice and thirty asso-
ciate justices, each of whom presides over one of the branch
courts into which the municipal court is divided. They are
elected by popular vote for six-year terms. The chief justice
has general superintendence of the business of the court and
assigns the associate justices to duty in the several branch
courts. The municipal court is provided with a clerk and a
bailiff, both of whom are elected by popular vote for six-year
terms. The elections for the judges, as well as for the clerk
and bailiff, take place on the Tuesday after the first Monday
in November. The judges of the municipal court hold fre-
quent meetings for the consideration of matters connected with
the administration of justice in that court. 19
It was practically necessary to amend the constitution be-
fore the municipal court could be properly established. This
17 Constitution, article vi, sections 23, 26 ; Berkowitz <v. Lester et al., 121 Illi-
nois, 99.
18 Constitution, article IV, section 34.
19 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 37, sections 264 ff. ; Lott <v. Davis et al.,
264 Illinois, 272.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 329
illustrates the rigidity of the constitution in respect to the or-
ganization of the inferior judicial tribunals. The legislature
does not possess sufficient discretion in the formation of courts
to supply the needed flexibility in judicial organization required
to meet changing conditions, especially in metropolitan areas.
The municipal court of Chicago has been called by compe-
tent authority " the pioneer modern judicial organization in the
United States." It is a coherent and unified organization in
that it has a real head in the chief justice. Under the statute,
this officer is empowered to determine the number of branch
courts to be necessary for the prompt and proper disposition of
the business of the court. The judges of the court are em-
powered to adopt rules regulating the practice in the court, sub-
ject to the provisions of the acts of the general assembly and
to the approval of the judges of the supreme court. The re-
sult of these provisions is shown in the efficiency and prompt-
ness with which the court dispatches business. Thus this court,
" thanks to a modern organization and simple procedure, dis-
posed in 1911 of 145,953 causes." 20
Although a proper organization of judicial machinery is
of prime importance in securing the efficient administration of
justice, nevertheless much also depends on the character of the
judges selected for the court. If the method of electing judges
of the municipal court by popular vote does not eliminate parti-
san political considerations, no matter how modern the organi-
zation of the court, the best results cannot be expected to be
obtained.
The circuit and county courts in the several counties of the
state have jurisdiction in juvenile cases, but in Cook county
it is provided that the judges of the circuit court shall designate
one or more of their number to constitute a branch court,
known as the juvenile court, to hear cases relating to depen-
dent, neglected, or delinquent children. 21
20 Pound, " Organization of Courts," American Judicature Society, Bulletin
VI, 23.
21 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 23, section 171 ; upheld as constitutional
in Lindsay et al. <v. Lindsay et al., 257 Illinois, 328.
330 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
A state tribunal of a somewhat special character is the
court of claims. This body is the successor of the commission
of claims established in 1877, the name having been changed
to court of claims in 1903. It is not, strictly speaking, a court,
since it is not provided for by the constitution; and the general
assembly has no power to create state courts in addition to
those provided in the constitution. Nevertheless it hears cases
in accordance with the usual rules of court procedure. It con-
sists of a chief justice and two judges, appointed by the gov-
ernor and senate for four-year terms. The secretary of state is
ex officio secretary of the court. It has jurisdiction to hear and
determine all claims against the state, but the judgment of the
court awarding damages against the state can be carried out
only through an appropriation passed by the general assembly. 22
As already pointed out, the circuit court is the court of gen-
eral original jurisdiction in all causes in law and equity both
civil and criminal, irrespective of the amount of money in-
volved or of the degree of the offense. The circuit court may
also entertain appeals from the final orders, judgments, and
decrees of the county courts, except in certain enumerated
cases, which are taken directly to the supreme or appellate
court. The appellate courts have no original jurisdiction of
any sort, their judicial duties being confined to hearing causes
carried, on appeal or writ of error from the county or circuit
courts. Although the appellate courts were established mainly
for the purpose of relieving the supreme court of some of the
evils of an overburdened docket, the jurisdiction of the appel-
late courts is not final in all cases; but, under the constitution,
cases may be carried from the appellate court on appeal or
writ of error to the supreme court in criminal cases and cases
in which a franchise of freehold or the validity of a statute is
involved and in other cases provided by law. 23 The jurisdic-
tion of the supreme court is to a large extent appellate in char-
22 Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 704-705; La<ws of 1917, 325-327.
23 Hurd' s Revised Statutes, chapter 37, section 212; Opinions of the Attorney-
General, 1916, p. 673; Constitution, article vi, section n; cf. Freitag <v. Union
Stock Yard and Transit Company, 262 Illinois, 551.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 331
acter, but original jurisdiction is conferred upon it in cases
relating to the revenue and in mandamus and habeas corpus
cases. In all other cases, it may hear and determine cases
brought on appeal directly from either the appellate, circuit, or
county courts. The decisions of the state supreme court are
final except in cases where a federal right is involved or the
validity of a federal statute is contested, which may be car-
ried on writ of error to the supreme court of the United States.
The judges of the state supreme court are bound by the pro-
visions of the federal constitution, as well as by those of the
state constitution. Under the latter constitution, judges of
courts of record inferior to the supreme court are required to
report annually to the judges of the supreme court such defects
and omissions in the laws as their experience may suggest; and
in turn the judges of the supreme court are required to make a
similar report annually to the governor, together with appro-
priate forms of bills to cure such defects and omissions in
the laws. It? does not appear, however, that the judges have
availed themselves of the opportunity thus afforded to exert a
positive influence on the making of the law. In 1909 Governor
Deneen requested the aid of the judges of the supreme court in
framing a valid primary election law, but the judges replied
that the aid sought could not properly be given under the above
provision of the constitution. 24
Although no specific authority is granted in the constitu-
tion to the courts to declare acts of the legislature unconsti-
tutional, such a power would seem to be implied in the provi-
sion that from the appellate courts appeals and writs of error
shall lie to the supreme court in all cases in which the validity
of a statute is involved. At all events, the courts, both inferior
and supreme, have assumed the possession of this power and
have exercised it on numerous occasions. Moreover, the rule
of presumption in favor of the validity of legislative acts is
seldom observed in Illinois. From the adoption of the con-
24 Constitution, article vi, section 31; Wright, Judicial Control of Legisla-
tion in Illinois, 37-42.
332 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
stitution of 1870 to the end of the June term of the supreme
court in 1913 the validity of laws was passed upon by that court
in 789 cases, in which the acts concerned were declared void in
257 cases and upheld in 532 instances. Many limitations upon
the legislature were placed in the constitution of 1870, which
have tended to increase greatly the number of cases in which
the constitutionality of laws is involved, as compared with the
period preceding 1870. With reference to such limitations, the
supreme court has declared that the general assembly is not
the final judge of such limitation; but when the question arises
in a judicial proceeding, the court must compare the particular
act with the fundamental law; and if found to be in conflict,
the limitation must be enforced. Or, as it was expressed in
another case, "the courts are bound to obey both the consti-
tution and the statutes, but in every case of a conflict between
the two the constitution, being the highest written law of the
State, must prevail." 23 To the extent, however, that an act
of the legislature is expressive of discretion and judgment, its
action must be regarded as final and not within the power of
courts to review, unless the discretion has been so grossly
abused as that it may be said not to have been exercised at all. 26
The importance of the judicial control over legislation
arises not only from the number of cases in which the validity
of statutes is involved, but also from the importance of the
statutes concerned. For example, as indicated in another chap-
ter, the supreme court declared three primary election acts
unconstitutional before a valid measure was enacted. The
power of the courts in this respect extends not only to acts of
the state legislature but also to acts of congress. 27
Many of the acts of the general assembly have been held
unconstitutional as being in conflict with the provision of the
bill of rights to the effect that " no person shall be deprived of
26 Constitution, article vi, section n; Wright, Judicial Control of Legisla-
tion in Illinois, 47-48 ; Knopf v. People ex rel., 185 Illinois, 20; Haller Sign Works
<v. Physical Culture Training School, 249 Illinois, 436.
26 People ex rel. v. Carlock, 198 Illinois, 150.
27 See, for example, People ex rel. v. Brady, 271 Illinois, 100 (101), in which
parts of the federal reserve act were held unconstitutional.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 333
life, liberty or property, without due process of law." 28 The
line of decisions of the supreme court, however, in which the
construction of this provision was involved has not clearly de-
fined its meaning; and it is impossible to foretell the fate of a
measure which is running the gauntlet of the supreme court's
interpretation of due process. Some acts of the general as-
sembly have also been held unconstitutional as violative of the
third article of the constitution providing for the distribution of
powers among the three distinct departments, legislative, exec-
utive, and judicial. This does not mean that the departments
shall be kept so entirely separate and distinct as to have no
connection with or dependence upon each other. From the
principle of separation of powers, however, it follows that
if the powers and duties of an officer belong to the judicial
department, he must either be elected by the people as the
ultimate sovereign authority of the state, or his appointment
and removal must be vested in the judicial department, and
his appointment cannot be delegated by the legislature to some
other body, such as a county board, nor his removal to a civil
service commission. It follows that the power to select officers
who are to act as assistants to the court in the performance of
judicial functions rests in the judicial department and is neces-
sary to the independent exercise of judicial power and the sep-
aration of the judicial department from the other departments
which are prohibited from exercising its functions. In pur-
suance of this principle, the court held unconstitutional a pro-
vision of the juvenile court act of 1907 which attempted to vest
the appointment of probation officers in the county board of
Cook county. On the other hand, the principle of separation
of powers is not an insurmountable bar to the conferring of
certain nonjudicial functions upon the courts, provided they
are not incompatible with the proper performance by the court
of its strictly judicial duties. Thus, the county court exercises
certain administrative powers, such as the appointment of
28 Constitution, article n, section 2 ; many acts have also been held uncon-
stitutional as violative of the prohibition against special acts conferring special
immunities, privileges, or franchises. Ibid., article iv, section 22.
334 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
drainage commissioners, of members of the county board of
review of assessments, and of election commissioners in cities
operating under the city election act and the exercise of gen-
eral supervision over the election machinery. So, an act of
the legislature giving the circuit or county courts the power to
appoint commissioners has been held to be a valid law; and
powers and duties imposed by statute upon a circuit judge, not
incompatible with his duties as judge, such as celebrating mar-
riages and taking the acknowledgment of deeds, may be right-
fully exercised by him. On the other hand, however, it was
held that the land title act of 1895 was unconstitutional by
reason of the fact that it attempted to confer judicial power
upon a nonjudicial officer, the county recorder of deeds. 29
The principle of separation of powers is also involved in
the question of the power of the courts to entertain appeals
from the orders and decisions of administrative bodies and
officers. In the well-known case of the City of Aurora v.
Schoeberlein 30 the supreme court had under consideration the
constitutionality of a section of the civil service act which al-
lowed an appeal from the decision of the civil service commis-
sioners to the circuit court. This provision was held invalid
on the ground that it attempted to delegate executive power
to a judicial body. In the course of the opinion, the court
pointed out that there could be no appeal in the legal sense un-
less there. had been a decision by a judicial tribunal. Under
this ruling, therefore, the courts do not possess jurisdiction to
review the findings of fact of an administrative body. In ques-
tions of the interpretation of the laws, however, the courts
may exercise jurisdiction over cases carried from such bodies
on writs of certiorari. It has been held, however, that the sec-
tion of the workmen's compensation act of 1913 providing that
the supreme court may review the decisions of the industrial
board as to questions of law by certiorari is invalid as it is in
29 Witter <v. County Commissioners of Cook County, 256 Illinois, 616; People
ex rel. v. Nelson et al., /jj Illinois, 565 (568) ; People ex rel. <v. Chase, 165 Illi-
nois, 527.
30 230 Illinois, 496.
;. THE STATE JUDICIARY 335
violation of that section of the constitution which expressly
limits the original jurisdiction of the supreme court to cases
relating to the revenue, mandamus and habeas corpus. On
the other hand, however, it was held in the same case that the
circuit courts have power, by certiorari, to review the decision
of the industrial board in cases coming under the workmen's
compensation act, to the extent of examining whether such
board has acted within its powers or has proceeded ille-
gally. 31
Although, in legal and judicial theory, the action of the
courts in declaring statutes unconstitutional consists merely in
applying the law as they find it to the facts of the case and in
discarding the less fundamental law in favor of the more fun-
damental when there is a conflict between the two, nevertheless
in reality the exercise of this power is the performance of a
discretionary and political act. The result of its exercise is
equivalent to the exercise of the legislative power of repealing
a statute, which is clearly a political act. The frequent exer-
cise of this power by the courts, therefore, tends to engender
the idea that the courts constitute a branch of the political de-
partment of the state government, and to encourage the move-
ment in favor of subjecting them to greater political responsi-
bility. In connection with this topic a competent authority has
declared that " the judicial power to pass on the constitution-
ality of legislation, as exercised by state courts with reference
to state constitutions for the last three or four decades, has de-
generated into a legislative power of veto, inviting parties
beaten in the legislature to transfer their fight to the courts,
converting the highest courts of the states into anomalous third
legislative chambers, where political questions of governmental
policy are debated and resolved by lawyers and judges under
the guise of debating and resolving legal. questions of govern-
mental power, substituting the arbitrary will of judges for the
31 Britton, Judicial Control over Public Officers in Illinois, 45-46 ; Matheny,
" Recent Legislation and Constitutional Decisions in Illinois," Illinois Law Re-
view, 3: 134-135; Constitution, article VI, section 2; Courier <v. Simpson Con-
struction Company, 264 Illinois, 488.
336 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
expressed will of the people, undermining and destroying the
principle of the supremacy of law, converting it into an intol-
erable supremacy of judges, where the will and not the law has
dominion." 32
Even more potent, however, as a cause tending to bring
the courts into politics is the prevalent method of selecting the
judges by popular vote for comparatively short terms of office.
This was introduced in Illinois as a result of the general dem-
ocratic wave which swept over the country during the first half
of the nineteenth century with the object and purpose of in-
creasing the control of the people over their state governments.
The result, however, has not been the success in accomplishing
this purpose as was anticipated. The long ballot has placed
such a heavy burden upon the voter that he has very largely
abdicated the function which he was supposed to perform and
has left the real selection of most of the elective officers to
the party managers. The conditions were such that the average
voter could not perform fully and intelligently the functions
which the elective system required of him. Judges, as well as
other officers remained nominally elective by the people, but
were in reality appointed by the political experts who con-
trolled the nomination of candidates and drew up the party
slate. In an effort to counteract the tendency toward the par-
tisan political control of judicial elections, the framers of the
constitution of 1870 placed the election of the most important
judges at a time separate from the election of other political
officers. Unfortunately, however, the relative, unimportance
of this election as compared with the joint election of governor,
legislature, and president, has tended to decrease the interest
of the voters in, and attendance at, judicial elections to such
an extent that the party organizations have usually experienced
little difficulty in controlling them. Prior to the enactment of
the primary election law, the candidates for the various judicial
offices were selected by the political parties in party nominating
82 Schofield, " The State Civil Service Act and the Power of Appointment,"
Illinois La-io Review, 7: 343.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 337
conventions. When the system of nominating conventions was
displaced and that of nominating candidates for public office
through party primaries was introduced, there was some differ-
ence of opinion as to whether judges should be included among
the officers to be nominated at the primaries. It was finally
decided, however, so to include them, in order that the people
might directly nominate their own judges instead of leaving
this function in the hands of the party bosses. As a matter of
fact, however, both under the old convention system and un-
der the system of nominating judges in party primaries, the
real control over the selection of the candidates for judicial
office, particularly in Cook county, has usually remained in the
hands of the political experts acting through the county central
committees of the principal political parties. Thus the judges
have often been dependent for their nomination and election
as well as for renomination and reelection at the end of their
terms, upon the will of those who control the organizations of
the principal political parties.
In order to remedy this admittedly unsatisfactory condi-
tion of affairs, a movement has grown in recent years to bring
about reform in the method of choosing the judges. This
movement for reform has taken two directions: first, toward
discarding the method of popular election in favor of appoint-
ment, and, secondly, toward retaining but improving the oper-
ation of the method of popular election. The method of ap-
pointment is deemed by many to be the natural and proper
method of selecting state judges because, in the first place, this
method has operated successfully in the case of the federal
judges; and secondly because judges are or should be experts,
and it is a well-recognized principle that the method of ap-
pointment is more satisfactory than that of popular election in
securing experts in any public office. Although our judges are
nominated and formally elective by popular vote, the virtual
abdication by the people of their function in choosing these
officers brings it about, as we have seen, that they are in reality
at present appointed by the person or group of persons who
338 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
control the nomination of the candidates of the majority party.
From this point of view, therefore, the proposal to change the
method of selecting judges from popular election to appoint-
ment is not so radical as it might at first seem. The substance
of the proposal is that since in any case most of the judges
must be selected by appointment, such appointment should be
formally recognized in the law instead of being concealed be-
hind the form of popular election, and that the power of ap-
pointment should be transferred from the present more or less
irresponsible holders of that power to some officer who can be
held responsible by the people for the character of the ap-
pointments which he makes.
There appears, however, to be some difference of opinion
as to who the appointing authority should be. Some favor ap-
pointment by the governor; others by an elective chief justice.
Either of these methods would probably be an improvement
over the present method of irresponsible appointment, at least
in the metropolitan districts of the state. 33 Should the power
of appointing judges be lodged in the hands of a chief justice,
the possible danger that the large powers vested in him might
be abused could be guarded against by making him elective by
popular vote for a comparatively short term of office and by
subjecting him to the possibility of recall by popular vote dur-
ing his term. It has been suggested that such possibility of
recall should be allowed only at stated annual intervals and
that the percentage of voters required to sign the recall petition
be sufficiently high so as to prevent the invocation of the power
of recall for trivial reasons and so as to prevent the manip-
ulation of recall elections by politicians in their own interest.
A chief justice vested with such large powers could not be ap-
pointed by the politicians with the same ease with which they
now frequently appoint inferior judges, for the election of
such a chief justice would be sufficiently important to attract
the attention and to arouse the intelligent interest of the mass
of the voters. Furthermore, in order to retain some direct
33 Illinois Law Review, 8:112-116.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 339
popular control over the judges appointed by the chief justice,
it might be provided that, at the end of the first term of each
such appointed judge, the question should be submitted to pop-
ular vote as to whether he should be retained for another
term. If the question is decided in the negative, the chief jus-
tice must then appoint another judge in his place. 34
In spite of the above considerations, however, it is hardly
probable that the people of the state would at any time in the
near future be willing to forego the right of electing their
judges. In the present state of public opinion, therefore, the
practical problem is, while retaining the form of popular elec-
tion, to reduce the influence of the party organizations in nom-
inating and electing judges. Prior to the enactment of the
primary election law of 1910, candidates for judicial offices had
been nominated under the delegate convention system. While
this left the selection of the judges largely in the hands of the
party organizations, the members of the bar, through their as-
sociations, exercised some influence through recommending the
selection of certain nominees for judicial positions. 35
The general movement for bringing the control of nom-
inations of elective officers into the hands of the people re-
sulted in repeated attempts to enact a valid primary election
law, which finally proved successful in 1910. This law pro-
vided for the nomination of judges, as well as other elective
officers, by direct primary. Under the provisions of this law,
the primaries for the nomination of judges to be elected in
June of any year were to be held in the preceding April. In
1913, however, the general assembly enacted certain hastily
considered amendments to the primary law, the effect of which
was to place the judicial primary only three weeks before the
election. Inasmuch as under the provisions of the primary
election act and under the ballot act of 1891 at least thirty-one
34 Kramer, " Constitutional Revision," Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar
Association, 1915, p. 364-365.
35 In 1893, fifty leading lawyers in Chicago met and chose a list of several
republicans and democrats from which they recommended a selection for judicial
officers in Cook county. Chicago Tribune, July 20, 1893.
340 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
days must elapse between the date of the primary and the date
of the election for judicial officers, the supreme court held in
1915 that the primary law, as amended in 1913, is incapable
of enforcement as to judicial offices. The result of this deci-
sion was to place the nomination of judicial officers under the
provisions of the ballot act of 1891, which provides for the
nomination of- elective officers by caucus or delegate conven-
tion or by the filing of nomination papers. 36
By those who favored the elimination of partisan political
considerations in the selection of judges, the effect of the su-
preme court's decision in the Sweitzer case in reintroducing the
old convention method of nomination was looked upon as
tending unfortunately in the direction of reaction rather than
of progress. The friends of nonpartisan election of judges
were aroused and a bill with the object of taking the selection
of judges out of politics was introduced in the general assem-
bly of 1915. It failed of enactment, though a measure pro-
viding for a separate judicial ballot in cities of more than
200,000 population was passed. In view of the failure of the
nonpartisan judicial election bill, the Chicago Bar Association
held a bar primary in May for making recommendations to the
voters to be followed in the judicial elections of June, 1915.
By majority vote, the members of the bar association approved
of certain candidates for supreme, circuit, and superior court
judgeships. In most cases the sitting judges were recommended
and elected. 37
36 Laws of 1913, p. 312; People ex rel. <v. Sweitzer, 266 Illinois, 459. This
decision of the supreme court, however, does not apply to the nomination of
judges of city courts and of the municipal court of Chicago, since in the case of
the latter judges three weeks is sufficient time to elapse between the nomination
and election of such judges. Consequently the primary election law applies to the
nomination of such judges. See Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 722,
733; 1916, p. 127, 159.
37 In 1913, the Illinois State Bar Association adopted the following resolu-
tions: "Resolved, That this Association favors a non-partisan judiciary in this
state, and to this end it favors an amendment of our primary laws so that candi-
dates for judicial positions shall be nominated by petition only, and that candi-
dates for such offices shall be printed in one column on a ticket, and printed, the
names to be interchangeable, so that one candidate will not occupy the first place
on the ticket more than another." Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar Associa-
tion, 1913, p. 218; Laws of 1915, p. 399.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 341
The decision of the supreme court in the Sweitzer case has
applied primarily to judicial offices to be filled at the June elec-
tion, and some doubt therefore existed as to whether it applied
also to the election of certain members of the superior court
of Cook county, which was to occur in November, 1917. In
order to dissolve this doubt, the general assembly in 1917, in-
stead of either remedying the defective provisions of the
amendatory primary act of 1913 by providing for a nonpar-
tisan judicial primary, or passing a genuine nonpartisan judi-
cial election act which would take party labels off judicial
ballots, enacted a measure which provides that candidates for
the offices of circuit judge and judge of the superior court of
Cook county shall be nominated by the county conventions of
the various political parties. This is practically equivalent to
nomination by the county central committees of the various
parties. 38
The question of the proper method of retiring judges is
closely connected with that of selecting them. Although the
popular recall of judges, strictly speaking, has not been intro-
duced into Illinois, the system of electing judges for compara-
tively short terms of office is tantamount to making them liable
to recall, subject to the limitation that such recall is operative
only at the end of the sitting judge's term, when he is a candi-
date for reelection. Judges may, however, be removed from
office during their terms by impeachment, and " the General
Assembly may, for cause entered on the journals, upon due
notice and opportunity of defense, remove from office any
judge, upon concurrence of three-fourths of all the members
elected of each house." 39
In addition to improvement in the methods of selecting and
retiring judges, other reforms which may be considered in con-
nection with the courts of Illinois relate to the procedure fol-
38 Laws of 79/7, 454-455 ; The Lawyer's Association of Illinois contends that
this act is unconstitutional, Chicago Herald, August 24, 1917. This contention,
however, was denied by the supreme court of the state, which held the act con-
stitutional. In the Cook county election of November, 1917, the bipartisan judicial
ticket was successful.
39 Constitution, article VI, section 30.
342 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
lowed in the administration of justice and to the organization
of the courts.
The procedure followed in the administration of justice
in the courts of Illinois is derived originally from the practice
of the English courts, though in England court procedure has
now been simplified while in Illinois reform in this respect still
lags behind. In Illinois, the same judicial system acts sep-
arately both as common law and equity court, and both legal
and equitable remedies may be administered in the same courts.
Thus in matters relating to guardianship, the probate court
may exercise equitable powers. In the trial of cases in equity,
a jury is not required, and the judge may determine both law
and fact. In all criminal cases, however, according to the crim-
inal code, juries shall be judges both of the law and of the
facts. In such cases, however, the power of the jury is in prac-
tice not always as great as this provision might seem to indi-
cate, for the supreme court has held that, under this provision
of the criminal code, it is not improper for the court to tell the
jury that " if they can say upon their oaths that they know
the law better than the court itself, they have the right to
do so;" but that "before saying this upon their oaths, it
is their duty to reflect whether from their study and expe-
rience they are better qualified to judge of the law than the
court." 40
In civil cases, trial by jury may be dispensed with by agree-
ment between the parties. When a jury is employed, it is com-
posed of twelve men, except in trials before a justice of the
peace, where a jury of six may be used, unless either party to
the case demands a larger number, not exceeding twelve. In
all important criminal cases, the accused party has a constitu-
tional right to trial by a petit jury of twelve men, and if the
crime of which he is accused involves punishment by imprison-
ment in the penitentiary, he cannot be held to answer for the
offense except on indictment of a grand jury. A grand jury
40 Dougherty, et al. <v. Hughes, et al., 165 Illinois, 384; Hurd's Revised
Statutes, chapter 22, section 40, chapter 38, section 431 ; Spies et al. <v. People, 122
Illinois, i (8), following Davison <v. People, QO Illinois, 221 (223).
343
consists of twenty-three jurors, before whom the evidence is
presented. The concurrence of a majority of these is necessary
in order to find a " true bill " against a person accused of crime.
A verdict of conviction by a petit jury requires a unanimous
vote. 41
In all counties outside of Cook, grand juries, whenever
required, are selected by the county board from among the
legal voters in the county, as near a proportionate number as
may be being taken from each town or precinct within the
county. For the purpose of selecting a petit jury, the county
board in each county outside of Cook selects a jury list com-
prising a considerable number of names of legal voters. Their
names are deposited in the jury box, and from this box a suffi-
cient number of names out of which to constitute the trial jury
are drawn by the clerk of the court in which the trial is to take
place. Members of juries must be residents of the county in
which the court is held, but certain classes of persons are ex-
empt by law from service on juries; these are usually the most
intelligent classes of people in the community, such as public
officers, ministers of the gospel, school teachers, and members
of the legal, medical, and journalistic professions. 42 In Cook
county, by an act of 1897, a board of jury commissioners com-
posed of three competent electors is chosen by the judges of
the several courts of record within the county, and serves for
a three-year term, subject to removal by the judges for cause. 43
It is the duty of the commissioners to make up a jury list con-
taining the names of the persons within the county legally qual-
ified for jury service and to maintain at all times a jury box
and a grand jury box containing not less than fifteen thousand
and one thousand names respectively, out of which a sufficient
number of names for grand and petit juries are drawn at ran-
41 Constitution, article II, sections 5, 8 ; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 79,
section 48 ; People v. Glowacki, 236 Illinois, 612.
42 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 78, sections 4, 8, 9. The attorney-general
has held that women are ineligible to serve on juries, notwithstanding the act of
1913 conferring on them a limited right of suffrage. See his Report and Opinions,
, P- 655; 1914, p. 387^
43 This act is constitutional. People ex rel. v. Onahan et al., i/o Illinois, 449.
344
dom by the clerks of the courts in which such juries are to
serve. 44
In making up the trial jury, each side is allowed to chal-
lenge any prospective juror for cause, and may also challenge
a limited number of jurors without assigning a cause. Preju-
dice against either party is a sufficient cause for challenge but
the fact that a juror has formed an opinion based upon news-
paper statements of the case does not necessarily disqualify him
from jury service in such case. When there is general preju-
dice against an accused person in a given locality, so that it
would be difficult to secure an impartial jury for the trial of the
case, a change of venue may ordinarily be granted so as to
transfer the trial to some other jurisdiction. A change of
venue for prejudice of the judge may also be secured, not by
transferring the case to another locality, but by calling in an-
other judge to try the case. 45
The jury should be to a large extent under the control and
subject to the direction of the court, but in some cases tried in
Illinois, as has been pointed out, "the trial judge is reduced
to the pitiful position of a mere presiding officer or moderator,
whose advice, based, it may be, upon extensive knowledge of
the law acquired by years of study and experience, may be dis-
regarded by dull, perverse or dishonest jurors. ... A
flagrant example of the 'lawlessness' of jurors in Illinois and
of the impotency of judges under such a system to prevent out-
right nullification of the law was recently afforded in Chicago
where thirteen different juries in the face of incontrovertible
evidence refused to convict saloon keepers for violating the
Sunday closing law, thus presenting an example of a complete
breakdown in the machinery of law enforcement." 40
Although the grand jury may sometimes be useful in com-
44 Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 78, section 29 ; cf. Ross, " The Jury Sys-
tem of Cook County, Illinois," Illinois Laiu Review, 5: 283-299.
45 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 78, section 14; People v. Gerold, 265 Illi-
nois, 448.
46 People v. McCauley, 256 Illinois, 504; People ex rel. v. Rodenberg, 254
Illinois, 386 (387) ; Garner, "Juries as Judges of the Law," Journal of Criminal
Law and Criminology, z: 184.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 345
pelling the attendance of witnesses and examining them under
oath, and in supporting the public prosecutor in proceeding
against powerful malefactors, it is nevertheless on the whole
an inefficient and cumbersome body composed of untrained
and irresponsible laymen. This inefficiency and cumbrousness
is shown in the mistakes which the grand jury makes in select-
ing the cases to be tried and in failing to examine at all many
cases in which true bills should probably be returned. It is
said that, in 1911, the grand jury in Chicago released with-
out a hearing twenty-eight per cent of those held on felony
charges. Furthermore, the necessity of waiting for grand
jury action is one of the most potent causes of delay in criminal
proceedings. 47
Other causes of delay in judicial proceedings consist in the
necessary compliance with the complicated and technical re-
quirements relating to drawing indictments, making pleadings,
setting aside verdicts for certain irregularities, and ordering
new trials or taking appeals from one court to another, the
reversal of lower courts for technical errors, and the granting
of numerous continuances for insufficient reasons. According
to the constitution, every person " ought to obtain, by law,
right and justice freely, and without being obliged to pur-
chase it, completely and without denial, promptly, and without
delay." 48 On account of the congested dockets some of the
courts, however, and the expense of litigation, the parties to
a case in court are often practically deprived of such consti-
tutional right.
In several recent sessions of the general assembly, bills
have been introduced looking toward the simplification of the
rules of practice and procedure in courts of justice, but they
have uniformly failed of passage. The Provine bill, Intro-
duced in the forty-ninth general assembly was based on meas-
ures previously proposed by the Illinois State Bar Association,
47 Vernier, " Annual Meeting of the Illinois Branch," Journal of Criminal
Law and Criminology, 4: 197; Mathews, Principles of American State Adminis-
tration, 466.
48 Article II, section 19,
346 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the Illinois Conference on the Reform of the Law of Practice
and Procedure, the Chicago Bar Association, Judge Hiram
Gilbert, and the Logan Hay subcommittee of the judiciary com-
mittee of the senate in the forty-eighth general assembly. In
spite of this imposing array of supporters, however, the bill
was unable to overcome the forces of inertia and conservatism.
The general principles relating to practice and procedure must
naturally be sanctioned by the legislature, but the detailed rules
might, as elsewhere, be drawn up by a commission of experts
appointed by the supreme court and subject to such amendment
from time to time by that court as experience may suggest.
Another judicial reform which has been agitated relates to
the proper organization and coordination of the courts. It
has been said by a competent authority that " Instead of a uni-
fied judicial system in Illinois we have a jumble of disconnected
and disjointed courts each pursuing its own way with but little
regard to any other. . . . As a system it has neither
head nor tail. The Supreme Court has no power to direct the
work of any other court or lay down a single rule for their
adoption, while any justice of the peace may declare all laws
of the legislature unconstitutional and void. Different meth-
ods of procedure prevail in the different courts, resulting often
times in the greatest confusion." 49 The truth appears to be
that the courts are still organized, in the main, according to
the plan and principle which were considered proper and suit-
able for the state in its infancy, when it was scantily populated
and largely rural in character. Under the present system
judges have no opportunity of becoming specialists in the dis-'
position of particular classes of cases, although some tenden-
cies toward specialization in character of function can be dis-
cerned, as in the case of the probate courts and such quasi-
judicial tribunals as the state public utilities commission. For
the most part, however, such specialization as exists is based
merely on the territorial principle. Specialization according
40 Gemmill, " What is Wrong with the Administration of Our Criminal
Laws?" Journal of Criminal Laia and Criminology, 4:701-702.
THE STATE JUDICIARY 347
to the nature of the work to be performed and the character
of the cases to be adjudicated is much more satisfactory from
the standpoint of increasing the experience, expertness, and
efficiency of the judiciary. This is especially true in metropol-
itan districts, where the evils resulting from lack of proper
specialization and coordination of the courts have been most
felt.
A committee of the State Bar Association on judicial admin-
istration reporting in 1909, complained that "there is the lack
of any rational grouping of judges for the purpose of sitting
continuously in certain classes of litigation, so as to become
unusually expert in the handling of the trial of such cases;"
and also a "lack of any authority in an administrative head,
which may be exercised for the purpose of controlling the per-
manent assignment of judges for different classes of work." 50
The need here indicated has been supplied to some extent in
Cook county through the establishment of the municipal court,
with a chief justice having large authority over his subordi-
nates. There is still a need, however, for the consolidation of
the courts of Cook county under a system of complete coor-
dination of its different branches and direction of an executive
head. 51 At the present time, in the Cook county courts there
is no system of assignments whereby a judge would specialize
in one branch of the law and thus develop into an expert. In
the general assembly of 1913, a bill known as the Curran-Kales
bill was passed providing for the reorganization of the circuit
and superior courts of Cook county so as to place the admin-
istration of each court in the hands of a judicial council of
three members, empowered to make up the calendars, assign
the judges and perform other duties incident to centralized
control and supervision. 52 In a metropolitan area, such as
Chicago, there should be but one court, with divisions or
50 Proceedings of the Illinois State Bar Association, 1909, p. 98.
51 This, however, would require constitutional changes. " Report of the
Committee on Judicial Administration," ibid., 204; 1914, part i, p. 213.
52 This bill, however, was vetoed by Governor Dunne, House Journal, 1913,
2160-2161.
348 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
branches for various classes of judicial work. The increasing
complexity of modern social and industrial conditions necessi-
tates, especially in the metropolitan areas, an increasing spe-
cialization in the organization and functions of the courts. As
the tendency toward specialization proceeds, however, the
greater becomes the need of coordination of the courts in order
that the judicial system may be properly integrated.
XVI. SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, AND ELECTIONS
POPULAR government in Illinois, as in other states, in so
far as it is really popular government at all, is such only
in a limited sense, inasmuch as certain classes of persons have
always been excluded from direct participation in public affairs.
Those upon whom the right to such participation has been con-
ferred may be called for distinction, the "political people," or
" the people," par excellence. In theory, the latter were sup-
posed to represent adequately the interests of those who were
excluded from direct exercise of political rights. The classes
of persons who are legally excluded have been reduced at pres-
ent, practically speaking, to almost an irreducible minimum
Grounds of disqualification for exercising the right to vote in-
clude lack of residence, lack of citizenship, minority, convic-
tion of an infamous crime, and sex (in the case of voting for
certain officers). Ground of disqualification for holding pub-
lic office include lack of residence, lack of citizenship, non-
attainment of a certain age, conviction of certain crimes, and
failure on the part of a holder of public moneys to make
proper accounting for all such funds. 1 It has been held that
all persons are equally eligible to office who are not excluded by
some constitutional or legal disqualification, and the fact of
eligibility does not even depend upon the right of suffrage. 2
In general, with scarcely any exceptions, the qualifications or
disqualifications prescribed for voters in state elections apply
equally to national and local elections.
In order to be eligible to vote in such elections, Illinois
requires a person otherwise qualified, to be a full-fledged citizen
of the United States, so that mere declaration of his inten-
1 Constitution, article iv, section 4; article V, section 5; article VII.
2 People ex rel. <v. McCormick, 261 Illinois, 413.
349
350 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tion to become a citizen is not sufficient. Such citizenship may
of course be acquired either by birth in the United States or by
the process of naturalization, or through what may be called
vicarious naturalization, i.e., the foreign born wife or minor
child may become a citizen of the United States through the
citizenship or naturalization of the husband or father. More-
over, it has been held that wives of sons made citizens through
the naturalization of their father during minority are citizens
entitled to vote, if otherwise qualified. Furthermore, under the
ruling of the Illinois court, a foreign born wife of a citizen of
the United States does not lose citizenship by the death of her
husband and her subsequent marriage to an alien, and her minor
children also become citizens by virtue of her citizenship. 3
Under the constitution, all persons having the qualifications
therein named have the right to vote, and the legislature has no
power to restrict that right, except in the case of those con-
victed of infamous crimes. It would seem to follow from this
that the right of insane persons to vote could not be restricted
by the legislature. There is a dictum of the state supreme
court, however, to the effect that the vote of a person non
compos mentis ought not to be received. The legislature has,
moreover, provided by law that inmates of poorhouses, insane
asylums, and hospitals shall not, for purposes of voting, be
deemed residents of the city or election district in which the
institution is situated. 4
The requirements in regard to residence are that a person,
in order to be a voter in any election must have resided in the
state one year, in the county ninety days, and in the election
district thirty days next preceding such election. In order to
constitute a residence within the meaning of this provision, a
"permanent abode" is necessary. What is meant by a "per-
manent abode" has been defined by the courts as depending
largely on the person's intention or animus manendi, and this
3 Dorsey v. Brigham, 177 Illinois, 250; Kreitz v. Behrensmeyer, 125 Illinois,
141 (142).
4 Sanner v. Patton, 155 Illinois, 553 (554) ; Welsh v. Shumway, 232 Illinois,
54 (55) i Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 66a.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 351
may be shown both by his declarations and his acts. It has
been held that an absence even for years, if the party all the
while intends it as a mere temporary matter, is not an abandon-
ment of residence. 5 With respect to the right of a college stu-
dent to vote, the rule has been laid down that he "may vote
in the place where the college is located if he is free from
parental control, regards the place where the college is located
as his home and has no other home to which to return; but his
mere presence at the college is not sufficient, as his residence
must be bona fide, with no intention of returning to his parental
home after completing his studies." 6
The constitution of 1870 made no provision for the exer-
cise by women of the right to vote, but they have nevertheless
been entitled to exercise this right to some extent since 1891.
In that year the general assembly passed an act granting to
women the privilege of voting at elections for any officer of
schools under the general or special school laws of the state.
In order to exercise this privilege, however, they must possess
all the qualifications applying to men voting in sucn elections,
namely, age, residence, citizenship, and registration. Thus,
where an immigrant has not received his naturalization papers,
his wife cannot vote at school elections, while, on the other
hand, the wife of a foreign born son, made a citizen during his
minority by his father's naturalization, thereby acquires the
right to vote at such elections, if otherwise qualified. 7 The act
of 1891, granting women the right to vote at school elections
was passed in pursuance of the constitutional mandate laid
upon the general assembly to provide a system of free schools.
In providing for such a system, the general assembly could in
its discretion select such method of choosing school officers as
B Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 66 ; Kreitz <v. Behrensmeyer,
125 Illinois, 141 (142) ; Moffett v. Hill, 131 Illinois, 239. Under the constitution,
" no elector shall be deemed to have lost his residence in this state by reason of
his absence on business of the United States or of this state, or in the military or
naval service of the United States." Article VH, section 4.
6 Welsh *>. Shumway, 232 Illinois, 54 (55) ; Report of the Attorney-General,
1910, p. 864; 1912, p. 1261; 1913, p. 598; 1914, p. 985, 993.
7 Hurd' s Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 332; Collier v. Anlicker, 189
Illinois, 34; Dorsey <v. Brigham, 777 Illinois, 250.
352 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
it might deem proper, and the qualifications of those voting
for school officers need not be the same as those of electors as
defined by the constitution, except in the case of school officers-
named in the constitution. The only school officers so named
are the state superintendent of public instruction and the county
superintendent of schools, and, consequently, for these officers
women cannot vote. The mere fact that women have the
right under the act of 1891, to vote for school officers other
than the two named in the constitution does not entitle them to
vote upon propositions submitted at school elections, such as
one for the establishment of a township high school. The pro-
visions of the act of 1891 relating to woman suffrage were in-
corporated in the general revised school law of 1909; and
under the latter law, women possessing the usual qualifications
of voters were also made eligible to any office under the gen-
eral or special school laws of the state. 8
The right of women to vote was further extended by an act
of 1913, providing that all women having the usual age, resi-
dence, and citizenship qualifications should be allowed to vote
at elections for presidential electors, the state board of equali-
zation, clerk of the appellate court, county collector, county
surveyor, members of board of assessors, board of review,
sanitary district trustees; for all officers of cities, villages, and
towns (except police magistrates) ; upon all questions or propo-
sitions submitted to a vote of the electors of such municipalities
or other political divisions of the state; for the following town-
ship officers: supervisor, town clerk, assessor, collector, and
highway commissioner; and they might also participate and
vote in annual and special town meetings. 9 This act has been
upheld as constitutional in so far as it authorizes women to
vote for the officers named, since the latter are within legisla-
8 Plummet v. Yost, 144 Illinois, 68; People ex rel. v. English, 139 Illinois,
622; People v. Welsh, 70 Illinois Appellate, 641; Hurd's Revised Statutes.
chapter 122, sections 269, 270.
9 Laivs of 1913, p. 333. Since highway commissioners are not township offi-
cers in counties not under township organization, women do not have the right
to vote for them in such counties. Report and Opinions of the Attorney-General^
tive control, none of them being of constitutional origin. The
right of women to vote under this act, however, is not quite as
extensive as might appear on the face of the act. Thus women
cannot vote for county collector in counties where this office is
exercised ex officio by the sheriff or county treasurer since the
latter officers are of constitutional origin. Again, women may
not vote for the county commissioners of Cook county, who
are constitutional officers, nor for the president of such board
of commissioners, nor for a judge of a city court, since the
manner of selecting this officer is indirectly indicated by the
constitution. Moreover, limitations rest upon the right of
women to vote upon certain propositions. Thus, women have
no right, as a rule, to vote at referendum elections provided for
in the constitution, such as upon a proposition for changing a
county seat, or for the holding of a constitutional convention.
Moreover, it has been held that women are not authorized,
under the act of 1913, to vote upon the question of organizing
a high school district, since school districts are not among the
municipalities mentioned in the act and do not become political
subdivisions of the state until after organization. Further-
more, it has been held that women are not entitled to vote for
delegates to national nominating conventions or for party
committeemen at primaries. 10
As to the actual participation of women in the suffrage, it
may be said that, in 1894, the number of women registered in
Chicago was about 30,000 of whom about 24,000 voted. Ten
years later the number registered was less than 2,000, of whom
only about 1,000 voted. In 1909, in an election in which they
could vote only for university trustees, 700 registered and less
than 500 voted. This falling off in the registration and vote
10 Scown <v. Czarnecki, 264 Illinois, 305 ; People ex rel. <v. Czarnecki et al., 265
Illinois, 489; Franklin <v. Westfall, 273 Illinois, 402 ; People ex rel. <v. Peltier et al.,
265 Illinois, 630; People ex rel. <v. Militzer, 272 Illinois, 387; People ex rel. v.
Byers, 271 Illinois, 600; Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 307, 416, 861.
The attorney-general has held that the mere fact that women have been made
voters does not confer upon them the privilege of serving on juries. Report and
Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1913, p. 655. On the other hand the attorney-
general has held that a woman may hold the office of deputy sheriff. Ibid., 1914,
P- 1339-
354 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
was natural after the novelty of the first voting wore off, con-
sidering the relative unimportance of the officers for whom
women were allowed to vote and the indifference of the party
organizations in getting out the woman vote. After the enact-
ment of the law of 1913, enlarging the scope of woman suf-
frage, there is naturally a great increase in the size of the
woman vote. In the Chicago mayoralty election of 1915,
about 232,000 women voted. In the presidential election of
1916, about 842,000 women throughout the state voted for the
candidates of the two leading parties, out of a total vote of
2,102,000 for these candidates. The percentage of men and
women voting the tickets of each of these two parties was about
the same in each case, indicating that the result of the election
would have been the same had the women not voted. It has
been generally true that, on general party lines, the women
vote substantially as the men do, and, in this respect, their influ-
ence in the elections has not been so radical as was predicted by
some persons. In elections, however, where party lines are
largely obliterated and issues are involved having a moral
aspect, the influence of the women has, with few exceptions,
been more decided. They have sometimes been a deciding fac-
tor in favor of the election of good government candidates in
local elections and in favor of the abolition of saloons in local
option contests. "At the local option elections in Illinois April
27, 1914, about 1,100 saloons out of 3,000, where elections
were held, were abolished; twelve dry counties were added to
the thirty already dry." J1
The influence of the electorate in choosing officers and
passing upon public questions is not usually exerted en masse,
but only through groups of voters organized into political par-
ties formed for the purpose of influencing the elections to pub-
lic office and of gaining control of the machinery of govern-
ment. In endeavoring to accomplish this purpose, the political
parties undertake to nominate candidates for office, to draw up
platforms of principles, and to create and maintain permanent
11 Chicago Tribune, April i, 1916.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 355
party organizations. Formerly the political party was re-
garded as a voluntary association of voters, similar to a reli-
gious sect, and therefore not a proper subject of legal regula-
tion. This view, however, is no longer held and the political
party is now regarded as a governmental agency which is an
appropriate subject of legal regulation, but the movement
toward such regulation has been a slow and gradual one. The
early laws were optional and local in character and aimed prin-
cipally at the correction of certain abuses which had grown up
in connection with nominations and elections. An optional
city election act was passed in 1885 which provided for the
appointment by the county court of a board of three election
commissioners in cities adopting the act, which should have
charge of the registration of voters and the holding of elec-
tions. The two leading political parties were recognized as
entitled to representation on the board and in the selection of
judges and clerks of election. 12 This act was immediately
adopted by Chicago and has now been adopted by nearly a
dozen cities, including East St. Louis, Springfield, and Peoria.
The movement to subject political parties to legal regula-
tion involved the formulation of a definition of a political
party. This became especially necessary in connection with
the introduction of the uniform Australian ballot, prepared
and printed by the government, for the question immediately
arose as to the method of determining what names should be
printed on the ballot as the candidates of the several political
parties. To print upon such official ballot the names of candi-
dates in accordance with a mere certificate of nomination caused
to be filed with the proper official by a convention or other body
representing an association of qualified voters is in itself a
recognition that such association of voters constitutes a politi-
cal party. Thus, under the act of 1891 introducing the Aus-
tralian ballot into Illinois elections, it was provided that " any
convention of delegates, caucus or meeting representing a
political party which at the general election next preceding
12 Hurd'i Revised Statutes, chapter 46, sections 171, 180.
356 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
polled at least two (2) per cent of the entire vote cast in the
State or in the electoral district or division thereof, or the
municipality for which the nomination is made, may for the
State, or for the electoral district or division thereof or munici-
pality for which the convention, caucus or meeting is held, as
the case may be, by causing a certificate of nomination to be
duly filed, make one such nomination for each office therein to
be filled at the election." The two per cent rule, is, of course,
an arbitrary limitation, and it may happen that an association
of voters having all the other essential characteristics of a
political party fails to poll the required percentage of votes.
Provision is made for this case as well as for the case of a
candidate of an independent group of voters by the next section
of the same act, which provides that nominations of candidates
for any office to be filled by the voters of the state at large may
also be made by nomination papers signed for each candidate
by not less than one thousand qualified voters of the state and,
in the case of candidates for local offices, by a specified per-
centage of the voters at the next preceding general election in
the given locality. 13
As illustrating the operation of the above provisions, it
may be noted that, in the general election of 1916, nomina-
tions for governor and state officers were made by five parties,
democratic, republican, socialist, prohibition, and socialist
labor. Of these, the last two had not polled two per cent of
the total vote at the next preceding general election and conse-
quently had to make their nominations by filing nomination
papers. Of the other three parties, although each of them
had polled at least two per cent of the total vote at the next
preceding election, one of them, the socialist party, polled so
few votes as compared with the two leading parties that it
should be denominated a minor party and grouped for most
purposes with the other two minor parties rather than with the
two major parties. For the purpose of making nominations
under the direct primary election law, however, as will be seen
13 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, sections 291, 292; Report of the Attor-
ney-General, 1908, p. 734.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 357
later, the parties coming under the two per cent rule are
grouped together.
No political party can, under ordinary conditions, expect
to win success at the polls without maintaining some sort of
organization. This organization consists principally of con-
ventions and party committees of various grades and kinds.
Provision is made under the direct primary election law for
county, congressional, and state conventions. Formerly, the
arrangements for holding the conventions, such as time and
place of meeting and ratio of representation were entirely in
the hands of the party committees. Thus, in 1898, the re-
publican state committee decided that the state convention of
that party should be held at Springfield on June 14, 1898 ; and
the ratio of representation was fixed at one delegate for each
four hundred votes and major fraction thereof cast for Mc-
Kinley in 1896. This ratio made a convention of 1,521 dele-
gates, of whom 555 were from Cook county. 14 The ratio of
representation in the republican state convention of 1916 was
fixed at one delegate for each four hundred votes cast for L. Y.
Sherman for senator in November, 1914. In the democratic
state convention of 1916, there were 1,029 delegates, of whom
343 were from Cook county. 15 The date of holding state con-
ventions and the method of electing delegates thereto have
now come under legal regulation. Conventions are required to
be held shortly after the April primaries. The county con-
vention consists of a meeting of the members of the county
central committee and is empowered to choose delegates to the
congressional and state conventions of its party. The con-
gressional convention is empowered to choose delegates to na-
tional nominating conventions and to recommend to the state
convention of its party the nomination of candidates for presi-
dential electors. Since the amendments of 1913 to the primary
law, however, the delegates and alternate delegates to the na-
tional nominating conventions have been chosen by the party
14 Chicago Tribune, February 24, 1898.
15 Chicago Herald, April 14, 1916.
358
voters at the direct primary election. Possibly, the power of
congressional conventions to choose such delegates might be
operative when, for any reason, the party voters fail to choose
them at the direct primary election, but the attorney-general
has held that the congressional conventions have no longer any
official duty to perform with reference to the selection of such
delegates. 16
The power of the state convention to make nominations of
candidates for state offices was formerly much greater than at
present. Under the Australian ballot law, the convention was
recognized as the official representative of the party for the
purpose of making nominations to elective offices. But, under
the present primary law, it is empowered to nominate candi-
dates only for presidential electors, for trustees of the Uni-
versity of Illinois, and for any other offices the nomination of
candidates for which is not provided for in the primary elec-
tion law. In addition, it is empowered to adopt the party
platform. 17 The parties have adopted the practice, in years
in which a governor is to be elected, of holding an adjourned
session of the state convention after the September primaries
and, at such session adopting the state platform. Since the can-
didate of the party for governor is then known, this practice
naturally gives the gubernatorial candidate of each party more
influence in drawing up the platform and consequently more
weight to the platform itself.
Central or managing committees for each political party
are specified in the primary election law, corresponding to the
various grades of government. Thus, for each party there are
a state central committee, a congressional committee for each
congressional district, a senatorial committee for each sena-
torial district, a county central committee for each county, a
city central committee for each city or village, a precinct com-
mittee for each precinct, and in Chicago a ward committee
for each ward.
16 Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1915, p. 731.
17 People ex rel. <v. Sweitzer, 266 Illinois, 459; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chap-
ter 46, section 461.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 359
Under the direct primary election law, it is provided that
the state, senatorial, and precinct or ward committees shall be
elected by the primary electors of the respective parties. State
central committeemen are elected by the primary electors of
each party, voting by congressional districts. The county and
city central committees consist of the precinct and ward com-
mittees, if any, within their respective territorial limits, while
the congressional district committees are composed of the
chairmen of the county central committees of the counties com-
posing such district. Each committee may elect a chairman
from its own membership. It has sometimes happened that
the real party control was not in the hands of the party commit-
tees but in those of one man or small group of men who held
no official position in the party. An attempt to remedy this
abuse is made in the direct primary election law by the pro-
vision that the " several committees shall not have power to
delegate any of their powers or functions to any other person,
officer, or committee." 18
The power of the party machine over the nomination of
candidates for public office under the convention system was so
extensive as to lead to grave abuses. The delegates to the con-
ventions ceased to be representative of the rank and file of the
party and were sometimes mere dummies acting under the
domination of a small group of leaders. Of the more than
seven hundred delegates to a Cook county convention which
met in 1896, it is said that 265 were saloonkeepers, 148 were
political employees, 84 were ex-Bridewell and jailbirds, and 43
had served terms in the penitentiary for murder, manslaughter,
or burglary. 19 It is not surprising that nominations made by
such conventions were unsatisfactory to the mass of voters. In
order to remedy these and other abuses, the system of nomina-
tion by direct primary elections was introduced shortly after
the beginning of the twentieth century. The demand for
primary legislation arose immediately out of the gubernatorial
18 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 460.
19 Ray, An Introduction to Political Parties and Practical Politics, 92.
360 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
contest in the republican party in 1904. There were six can-
didates, five of whom made a general canvass throughout the
state. At the republican state convention, there were double
delegations from eleven counties. The republican state con-
vention unseated 112 delegates, while the democratic conven-
tion unseated 241 delegates. 20 The republican state conven-
tion, consisting of 1,502 delegates, was in session from May 12
to June 3, 1904, and took seventy-nine ballots for governor
before a candidate was nominated as a result of combinations
and withdrawals by some of the other aspirants for the office.
During the deadlock a resolution was introduced to refer the
governorship nomination directly to the republican voters of
the state, to be voted upon at a special primary to be called for
that purpose in all parts of the state on the same day. After
some discussion, the resolution was tabled. Primary elections
to choose delegates to nominating conventions had already
been in existence for many years. In 1885 an act was passed
prohibiting any except persons qualified to vote at regular elec-
tions from voting at primary elections or elections called to
select delegates to party conventions. 21
The first of a long series of acts designed to regulate the
whole process of the nomination of candidates by political
parties was enacted in 1889 under the title, " an act to regulate
primary elections of voluntary political associations, and to
punish frauds therein." 22 This was merely an optional act, to
be used or not at the discretion of the party committees and has
since been repealed. The first primary election act in Illinois
which introduced the compulsory principle was enacted in 1898,
though it was compulsory in Cook county only and was optional
in other parts of the state. This law, and the amendatory act
of 1901 were noteworthy as early attempts to apply to primary
elections the system of regulations and safeguards already in
force at general elections. None of these acts, however, pro-
vided for the nomination of candidates by direct primary elec-
20 Chicago Tribune, May 24, 1906.
21 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 360.
22 Laws of 1889, p. 140.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 361
tion. The popular desire for the introduction of the latter sys-
tem was indicated in November, 1904, when a proposition was
submitted under the public policy law to the effect that the
primary laws should be amended so as to provide for party
primaries at which the voter would vote under the Australian
ballot directly for the candidate whom he wishes nominated
by his party. The proposition was approved by a decided
majority of the votes cast on the proposition and also by a
majority of all the votes cast at the election. 23
In pursuance of this popular mandate, the legislature has
passed in quick succession four direct primary election acts, in
1905, 1906, 1908, and 1910. The first three of these acts
were declared unconstitutional by the state supreme court for
various reasons, none of which, however, went to the extent of
affecting the general power of the legislature to regulate pri-
mary elections. 24 The first act was held unconstitutional partly
on the ground that it attempted to apply to Cook county pro-
visions different from those in the rest of the state, and this was
in violation of the constitutional prohibition against local and
special legislation. The court also held that the act violated
the constitutional provision that all elections shall be free and
equal, as a primary election, the court held, is an election within
the meaning of this provision. The act of 1906 was held un-
constitutional partly because it permitted only one candidate
for representative in the general assembly to be nominated by
popular vote and required additional candidates to be nom-
inated by the senatorial convention, and partly because it at-
tempted to confer the power of establishing delegate districts
upon county central committees, which were declared not to be
public agencies.
The act of 1908 was declared unconstitutional for two
23 Laws of 1898, p. ii ; Illinois Blue Book, 1907, p. 515.
24 The act of 1905 was declared unconstitutional in People ex rel. v. Board of
Election Commissioners of City of Chicago, 221 Illinois, 9, that of 1906 in Rouse
v. Thompson, 228 Illinois, 522; and that of 1908 in People ex. rel. v. Strassheim,
240 Illinois, 279 (280). For a review of the acts and cases see Jones, " The Direct
Primary in Illinois," Proceedings of the American Political Science Associa-
tion, 7: 138 ff.
362 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
principal reasons. In the first place, it was held invalid be-
cause although it made provision whereby nonregistered vot-
ers who had moved into an election district since the last regis-
tration might be sworn in and allowed to vote, it made no
similar provision for voters becoming of age, becoming natu-
ralized or otherwise becoming entitled to vote since the last
registration day in cities operating under the city elections act
of 1885. The second reason for declaring it invalid was be-
cause it allowed primary electors to cast only one vote for each
of as many candidates for representative in the general assem-
bly as are to be nominated by his party, as determined by the
senatorial committee and thus denied to such elector the consti-
tutional right to vote for three candidates for representative or
to cumulate his vote upon or divide it between a less number.
The court was thus led to some strange conclusions, due to its
fundamental assumption that a primary election is an election
within the meaning of the constitutional use of that term. 25 In
spite of the invalidity of the three acts, nevertheless primary
elections were held under them in 1906 and 1908, and the suc-
ceeding elections were held at which the candidates nominated
at such primaries were duly voted for. The supreme court held
that, after an election has been held, the title of the successful
candidates to their offices is not affected by holding unconstitu-
tional the primary act under which they were nominated. 26
In order to avoid, if possible, the fate which had befallen
the previous primary election acts, that of 1910 is divided into
two parts which are really separate measures, one of which
relates to nominations for other than members of the legisla-
ture and the other is confined to the nomination of candidates
for membership in the house and senate and to the election of
senatorial committeemen. In order to conform to previous de-
cisions of the supreme court, the legislative primary act pro-
vided for a cumulative vote for nominating candidates for rep-
resentative in the general assembly. It was also provided that
25 For criticisms of the supreme court's decision in the primary election
cases see articles by L. M. Greeley in Illinois Laiu Review, 4:227-242; 5: 502-508.
26 People ex rel. v. Strassheim, 240 Illinois, 279 (280).
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 363
the senatorial committee of each party should, by resolution,
" fix and determine " the number of candidates to be nominated
by their party for representatives. This provision was made
the subject of attack in subsequent proceedings before the su-
preme court, but by a close vote, the court upheld it as not un-
constitutional. 27
The mandatory, state wide, direct primary law of 1910,
with subsequent amendments thereto, has thus far, in the main,
passed successfully the gauntlet of the courts. Its principal pro-
visions are as follows: the names of the candidates for the vari-
ous offices are placed on the primary ballot only as the result
of the filing with the proper officer of a petition for nomina-
tion, containing the required number of signatures. The can-
didates to be nominated in the direct primary are all those for
all elective state, congressional, county, city, town, and village
offices, members of the board of equalization, clerks of the ap-
pellate courts, and trustees of sanitary districts. Precinct,
ward, and state central committeemen, and delegates and alter-
nate delegates to national nominating conventions are also
elected at the direct primary. In the case of a candidate for a
state office, the signatures of not less than one thousand and
not more than two thousand primary electors of his party are
required. For most other offices, the signatures of at least
one-half of one per cent of such electors in the district are re-
quired. The petitions must be filed in the office of the secretary
of state, the county clerk, or the city clerk (depending on the
character of the office for which the nomination is sought) , not
more nor less than a certain number of days prior to the date of
the primary. In 1912, more than one thousand petitions of
candidates for place on the primary ballot were received in the
office of the secretary of state by mail and messenger. 28 In
1916, the number was between twelve and fifteen hundred. A
reduction in the number of petitions might be effected by in-
creasing the percentage of voters required to put a name on
27 People ex rel. v. Deneen, et al., 247 Illinois, 289.
28 Chicago Record-Herald, February 10, 1912.
364 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the primary ballot but if the percentage were too great, undue
weight might be given to the use of money in securing signa-
tures. It seems possible that the means provided for ascertain-
ing the authenticity of signatures might be improved. The
names of candidates for nomination for each office are printed
on the primary ballot, as a rule, in the order in which their
petitions for nomination are filed. This provision has some-
times led to disgraceful scrambles among the candidates or
their representatives in order to secure the advantages deemed
to arise from first place on the ballot. 29 The law in this re-
spect might be improved by providing for alphabetical arrange-
ment with rotation of names on different sets of ballots. But
the mere fact that first place on the ballot is of such decided
advantage to a candidate would seem to indicate that the can-
didates are too numerous or the offices too unimportant for the
voters to make an intelligent choice.
At the direct primary election, the date for holding which
is determined by law, the usual safeguards and methods of
procedure in force at general elections are required. The
judges and clerks at general elections occupy the same offices
at primary elections. There are the same provisions regard-
ing ballot boxes, challengers, electioneering, and bearing the ex-
pense of the election in both cases. The primary elections for
all political parties are held on the same day and at the same
place, but there is a separate primary ballot for each such
party. The same qualifications are in the main required of
voters at primary elections as at general elections. Under the
primary election law, women possessing the usual qualifications
as to age, residence, and citizenship are given the right to vote
at the primary " for the nomination of candidates for such
offices as such women may vote for at the election for which
such primary is held." 30 It has been held, however, that
women are not entitled to vote for delegates to national con-
ventions or party committeemen at primaries. 31
29 Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. xxxiv.
30 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 494.
31 People ex rel. v. Byers, 271 Illinois, 600.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 365
The qualifications of voters at a primary election may be
said to differ from those at a general election in that no person
is entitled to vote at a primary election unless he declares his
party affiliation. If the would-be primary voter has voted at a
primary of another political party during the preceding two
years or has signed the petition for nomination of a candidate
of any party with which he does not affiliate or has signed the
nomination papers of an independent candidate, he is disquali-
fied from voting at the primary election at which such candi-
dates are to be voted for. These provisions put into effect in
Illinois the closed primary as distinguished from the open
primary found in some states. It is said that the two-year rule
of the primary law prevented thousands of progressives from
taking part in the primaries of their party in the spring of
I9I3. 32 The closed primary is embarrassing and discourag-
ing to the independent voter who does not wish to affiliate with
any political party, while at the same time exercising some in-
fluence on the nominations, but is deemed desirable by some ob-
servers in order to prevent the voters of one party from con-
spiring to secure the nominations of undesirable candidates for
another party. The person receiving the highest number of
votes at the primary as a candidate of a party for the nomina-
tion for an office is the candidate of that party for such office.
Under this plurality system, where a large number of candi-
dates are contending for nomination for the same office the
candidate may be nominated by a very small percentage of the
voters.
Most observers are agreed that the experience thus far had
with the direct primary in Illinois shows it to be decidedly
superior to the delegate-convention method of making nomina-
tions. It tends to reduce the control of the party machine over
nominations and correspondingly to increase that of the rank
and file of the voters. It is not, however, without defects,
some of which appear to be remediable while others appear to
be inherent in the system. As actually administered, direct
82 Chicago Record-Herald, April 10, 1913.
366 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
primaries tend to complicate the system of elections and to
multiply their number, so that such a burden is placed upon the
voter that he may fail to bear it except perfunctorily, and thus
the party machines may actually retain virtual control of nom-
inations. The primary election tends to complicate the system
of nomination machinery to such an extent that only the trained
politician can operate it to advantage. Although frowned
upon in some quarters as a violation of the spirit of the direct
primary law, a natural result of the complicated primary elec-
tion machinery is the practice of slate-making sometimes in-
dulged in by the party leaders. The organization slate of can-
didates usually wins, though not so frequently as under the
delegate-convention system, for now the slates must be made
up before the primary election and the voters have the oppor-
tunity of eliminating the organization candidates if they are
especially bad. This very fact places more pressure upon the
organization leaders to put forward good men than was ex-
erted upon them under the convention system. Many voters,
however, maintain an apathetic state of mind toward the pri-
maries; and the percentage of voters who vote at the direct
primary elections is not usually as large as that at the general
elections but is decidedly larger than that of the voters who
participated in the indirect primaries under the old conven-
tion system. Some of the remediable defects of the direct
primary were indicated in one of the questions of public policy
submitted to the voters in 1912, suggesting the passage of an
act to " abolish the scandals and disorder now incident to the
filing of petitions, to increase the secrecy of the ballot and the
political freedom of the voter, to simplify the system and re-
duce the expense of elections and to encourage a greater popu-
lar participation in primary elections to the end that nomina-
tions may represent more truly the judgment of majorities." 33
It is generally agreed by competent observers that the prin-
ciple of the short ballot should be applied to primary elections
as well as to general elections, and that the people should be
33 This proposition was approved by a vote of 524,00x3 to 158,000.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 367
expected to nominate candidates only for such offices as are
sufficiently important to attract general public attention. Where
the long ballot prevails, the system of nomination by primary
election may be more objectionable in some respects in the case
of state than in local elections, though, in the latter, nomina-
tion by petition without party designation is preferable to nom-
ination in party primaries. Direct primaries tend to increase
the public expense in holding elections and may also largely in-
crease the campaign expenses of the candidates for important
state wide or city wide offices. This naturally gives an ad-
vantage to the organization candidate or to the wealthy candi-
date who is able to build up a personal organization backing
him. It is necessary, however, under the direct primary sys-
tem for the candidates for important offices to appeal directly
to the rank and file of the voters instead of merely to organiza-
tion leaders and party managers who control delegates, as was
the case under the convention method of nomination. Al-
though this circumstance may militate somewhat against the
solidarity of party organization, it seems to tend in the direc-
tion of more democratic control over the forces which, in turn,
control the government. In the case of the governor, the
method of nomination by direct primary election tends to in-
crease his prestige and influence as the leader of his party,
provided that the rivalries and enmities which may have been
engendered during the primary campaign are sufficiently healed
after the election.
Some of the objections to the closed party primary, as
operated in Illinois, might be avoided through what is known
as the nonpartisan primary, which has been introduced in some
states in connection with judicial and local elections. Nomina-
tion of candidates for judicial office in Illinois is not provided
for in the primary law in a manner capable of enforcement;
and hence candidates for judgeships may be nominated by peti-
tion or by party convention or caucus, as provided for in the
ballot law of iSQi. 34 Provision is made, however, for the
34 People ex rel. <v, Sweitzer, 266 Illinois, 459; Opinions of the Attorney-
368 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
nomination of candidates for certain local offices by nonpartisan
primary, under the commission form of government act of
1910. It is provided under this act that the names of can-
didates for mayor and commissioners shall be placed alpha-
betically on the primary ballot as the result of the filing of peti-
tions. It is specifically declared that the ballots "shall have
no party, platform or principle designated, or appellation or
mark whatever, nor shall any circle be printed at the head of
the ballot." 35 The names of the two highest candidates for
mayor and of the eight highest candidates for commissioner
are printed on the official ballots at the regular election, and
to these ballots the same prohibition regarding party designa-
tion, circle, et cetera, applies as in the case of the primary bal-
lots. 36 The advantages of this plan are, first, it tends to sep-
arate local from state and national politics; secondly, it makes
it unnecessary for the state to formulate a legal test of party
affiliation; and, finally, it embodies the principle of a majority
rather than a plurality election. It is felt by many persons
that this plan should at once be extended to nominations for
judicial offices, and, in time, for all state offices, in order to
separate state from national politics.
Whatever may be the form of nomination, whether con-
vention or closed or nonpartisan primary, the regular or gen-
eral election follows as the next step in the process of choosing
public officers. For the purpose of holding such election, the
practice is followed of appointing special election judges and
clerks, rather than utilizing the regular local officials to per-
form this function. In cities which have adopted the provi-
sions of the city elections act of 1885, there is appointed by the
county court of the county in which the city is located a biparti-
san board of election commissioners composed of three mem-
bers, which has general charge of registration of voters and
General, 1915, p. 722. By an act of 1917 it is provided that candidates for the
office of circuit judge and superior court judge of Cook county shall be nominated
by county conventions of the various political parties. Laws of 1917, p. 454.
35 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 24, section 1931114.
36 Ibid., section 1931119.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 369
holding of elections. This board divides the city into election
precincts, each containing approximately three hundred voters,
and selects the judges and clerks of election for confirmation
and appointment by the county court. 37 Of the three judges
and two clerks appointed for each precinct, at least one judge
and one clerk must be selected from each of the two leading
political parties in the state. In places where the city elections
act of 1885 is not in force, the county board of supervisors or
commissioners establishes election precincts or districts, each
containing approximately four hundred voters, and appoints in
each such precinct or district three judges of election, no more
than two of whom shall be members of the same political
party. 38 The judges and clerks receive a compensation fixed
by law, which, in the case of local elections, is paid by the city
or township, and by the county in the case of general, county,
and state elections.
The judges in each precinct constitute a board of registry,
which is required to meet three weeks before an election for
the purpose of making a list of the qualified voters of the pre-
cinct, drawn from the poll lists of the preceding election and
from the personal knowledge of the judges. Names of quali-
fied electors, however, may be sworn in on election day. In
cities operating under the act of 1885, however, the method
of personal registration is followed, and a person who is not
registered cannot vote on election day even though he offers
to make an affidavit that he is a qualified voter. By an act of
1917 there is provided, in cities of one hundred and fifty thou-
sand population and over, a central registration place, which
remains open for the convenience of voters between general
registrations. 39
Under the ballot act of 1891, it is provided that, in all gen-
eral elections, voting shall be by ballots printed and distributed
at public expense and that no other ballots shall be used. This
37 More than eleven thousand judges and clerks of election are appointed for
Cook county alone.
38 Report and Opinions of the Attorney-General, 1914, p. 553.
39 Report of the Attorney-General, 1908, p. 724; Laws of 1917, p. 460.
370 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
expense is a charge on the cities, villages, and towns in the case
of municipal elections, and on the counties in all other elec-
tions. The form of ballot required by law is that known as the
Indiana or New York form of the Australian ballot, in which
the candidates of the several political parties for the various
offices are arranged in separate columns. Moreover, the party
appellation and party circle are printed at the top of each
party column. Prior to 1897 the same candidate might be
nominated by two or more parties and his name appear in two
or more party columns. Thus, on the official ballot used at the
general election of November, 1896, the name of William J.
Bryan, appeared in the democratic, people's, and middle of
the road party columns and the name of John P. Altgeld ap-
peared in that of the democratic and people's party columns.
Under the ballot law as amended in 1897, however, the name
of a given candidate is prohibited from appearing upon the
ballot under the name of more than one party. 40 It is not
difficult to imagine circumstances under which this provision,
by preventing the fusion of independent groups or minority
parties, might operate to the advantage of the major party
organization. Although sample ballots may be distributed
before the election, and must under the law, be published in
newspapers, the official ballot, indorsed with the initials of one
of the election judges, may as a rule be obtained by the voter
only from such judge at the polls on election day. By acts of
the general assembly passed in 1917, however, provision is
made whereby legally qualified voters who are absent from
their voting precincts on election day on account of business or
other duties may have their votes counted by mailing their bal-
lots to the election officers. At the same time provision was
made for absent voting by qualified voters enlisted in the mili-
tary service of the state or of the United States. 41
Prior to 1899, if a constitutional amendment or other pub-
lic measure were submitted to a popular referendum, such ques-
40 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, sections 288, 295 ; People v. Czarnecki,
256 Illinois, 320; Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. 389, 393; 1915, p. 720.
41 Laws of 1917, p. 434, 440.
tion was printed upon the ballot after the list of candidates. It
was found, however, that, under this arrangement, many vot-
ers, having voted for the candidates, either failed to notice the
proposition printed at the bottom of the ballot or, else, were
too little interested in the matter to take the trouble to vote
upon it. This self-elimination of the indifferent voter would
have been of no serious consequence had it not been that, under
the provision of the constitution relating to amendments, it is
required that a proposed amendment must, in order to be
ratified, receive a majority not of those voting upon the propo-
sition, but of those voting at the election. 42 Under this pro-
vision, a failure to vote on the proposition at all practically
amounted to a vote against it, and it was thus very difficult to
secure a favorable vote upon such proposition. Thus, in 1892,
1894, and 1896, proposed constitutional amendments were
submitted to popular vote, and, with the exception of the first
one, the votes cast upon the proposition were overwhelmingly
favorable. But the amendments failed of ratification because
they did not receive a majority of the votes cast at the election.
Consequently by an amendment to the election law, enacted
in 1899, it is provided that, whenever a constitutional amend-
ment or other public measure is proposed to be voted upon by
the people, the substance of such amendment or measure shall
be printed on a separate ballot, which is handed to the voter at
the polls together with the candidate ballot. Since the enact-
ment of this provision of law, three proposed constitutional
amendments have been submitted to the voters, two of which
have received a majority of all votes cast at the election and
the other one received a majority of all votes cast at the elec-
tion for legislative candidates. It may also be noted in this
connection that, under the act of 1901, questions of public
policy submitted to popular vote, are also printed on separate
ballots. 43
The Indiana or party-column form of ballot, as used in
42 Constitution, article xiv, section 2.
43 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, sections 303, 429. Among the different
forms of ballots used in Illinois elections are the following: men's general ballot
372 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Illinois, tends to facilitate straight party voting. By placing a
cross in the circle at the top of the party column, the voter
may vote for all of the candidates of the party, thus avoiding
the trouble and expenditure of time which would be involved
in placing a cross in front of the name of each candidate for
whom he wishes to vote. It is necessary for him to take this
time and trouble, however, if he wishes to " scratch his ticket,"
or to exercise independent judgment in voting, except that
where he wishes to vote for one or more candidates of a cer-
tain party, and, with these exceptions, to vote the straight
ticket of another party, he may do so by placing a cross in
front of the names of the one or more candidates and a cross
in the party circle of the party for whose candidates he wishes,
in the main, to vote. 44 Since a voter has a right to vote for
the candidate of his choice and is not confined to those
whose names are printed on the ballot, he may write in the
name of his own candidate in a blank space on the ticket, and,
by placing a cross in front of it have it count as a vote for such
candidate. 45 If a qualified voter, by reason of illiteracy or
physical disability, is unable to mark his ballot, he may be
assisted in marking his ballot by two of the election officers, of
different parties. In voting for representatives in the general
assembly, the voter may cumulate or " plump " his votes, that
is, he may divide his votes among candidates for representa-
tive as he sees fit, and may cast one vote for each of three can-
didates, three votes for one candidate, and one and one-half
votes for each of two candidates, or one vote for one candidate
and two for another. 46 In order to prevent illegal voting, each
for national, state, and local officers; women's separate ballot at general elections;
separate ballot for proposed constitutional amendments and public measures;
separate ballot for questions of public policy; judicial ticket for municipal judges
in Chicago; party ballot in primary elections; women's primary ballot; presiden-
tial preference primary ballot; judicial ticket for supreme and circuit court
judges.
44 Constant v. Shockey, 259 Illinois, 496.
45 Pierce v. People, ex rel., 197 Illinois, 432 ; Sanner <v. Patton, 755 Illinois,
553 ; Fletcher <v. Wall, 172 Illinois, 426.
46 People ex rel. <v. Taylor et al., 257 Illinois, 192; People ex rel. <v. Nelson
et al., 133 Illinois, 565 (567-568).
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 373
party is allowed to have a challenger representing it at the
polls. 47
The polls are so arranged that the ballot may be marked in
secrecy, and safeguards are provided to prevent undue influence
or illegitimate pressure from being brought to bear on the
voter to prevent him from exercising the free and untram-
melled right to vote according to the dictates of his own con-
science. Little is done by governmental action, however, posi-
tively to assist the voter to cast an intelligent ballot. In order
to preserve the secrecy of the ballot, the canvassing boards and
courts will ordinarily refuse to count any ballots which are
marked in such a way as to distinguish them from others, so
that a bribe-giver may be able to know that the votes which he
bought were delivered. As a rule, however, the courts will
endeavor to avoid disfranchising a voter on account of slight
inaccuracies in his ballot, and will give effect, as far as possible,
to the intention of the voter as expressed in his ballot, within
the forms prescribed by law. 48
Immediately after the polls are closed on election day, the
votes are canvassed by the judges of election. The returns
are delivered by such judges to the county clerk and transmitted
to the secretary of state. The county clerk issues certificates of
election to the candidates for county offices receiving the high-
est number of votes. The state canvassing board, consisting
of the secretary of state and other state officers in the presence
of the governor, canvasses the returns in the case of candidates
for the higher offices, and the governor proclaims the result of
the canvass. Election contests in the case of state executive
officers are heard by the legislature in joint meeting. The two
47 By an act of 1903, the use of voting machines at elections was authorized
when adopted by the voters. The act has been declared not unconstitutional.
Lynch <v. Malley, 215 Illinois, 574; People ex rel. v. Taylor et al., 257 Illinois, 192.
In 1913 a legislative commission was named to investigate the Chicago voting
machine contract and submitted two reports in 1915. The majority report advised
the cancellation of the contract and the repeal of the voting machine law. It
also stated that the machines were capable of being manipulated in a fraudulent
manner.
48 Pierce <v. People ex rel., 197 Illinois, 432 ; Smith <v. Reid, 223 Illinois, 493 ;
Winn v. Blackman, 229 Illinois, 198; Tandy v. Lavery, 194 Illinois, 372.
374 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
houses hear and determine contests of election of their re-
spective members. The circuit court determines contests for
judicial offices and the county court for local offices. 49
The influence of the voters at the polls may be exerted not
only in connection with the election of candidates and the pass-
ing upon proposed constitutions or constitutional amendments
but also in connection with ordinary legislation. Several ex-
amples of referenda on ordinary legislation are provided for in
the constitution. Thus, no debt can be contracted by the state
in excess of a quarter of a million dollars, except in case of
invasion, insurrection, or war; no act conferring banking pow-
ers upon corporations or associations can go into effect; and
the Illinois and Michigan canal or other canal or waterway
owned by the state can never be sold or leased unless ap-
proved by popular vote. No special act relating to the munici-
pal government of Chicago can go into effect unless approved
by the voters of that city; and no county can be divided nor the
county seat changed unless the proposition is approved by the
voters of the county. The proposition for contracting the debt
mentioned above must be submitted at a general election and,
in order to be approved, must receive a majority of the votes
cast for members of the general assembly at such election.
The referendum on conveying canal rights requires, for ap-
proval, a majority of all votes polled at the election. In the
case of special legislation for Chicago, conferring banking
powers and dividing a county, however, only a majority of the
votes cast on the question is required. 50 In addition to the
referenda required in the constitution, it seems probable that
the general assembly may also, in its discretion, provide that
the provisions of a law shall not go into effect in the state un-
less approved by the voters of the state, nor in a particular
locality unless approved by the voters of such locality. Thus,
the general assembly has provided for township or city local
49 Misch <v. Russell, 136 Illinois, 22; County of Lawrence <i>. Schmaulhausen
et al., 123 Illinois, 321 ; Kerr v. Flewelling, 235 Illinois, 326.
50 Constitution, article iv, sections 18, 34; article x, section 2; article xi,
section 5.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 375
option on the proposition of voting out the legalized sale of in-
toxicating liquor. Whether the proposition is to be submitted
at a general or special election and what majority of the voters
is necessary in order to approve the proposition are questions
to be determined by the general assembly in the act providing
for the referendum. The general rule seems to be that if a
proposition is submitted at a special election, a majority of the
votes cast upon the proposition is sufficient to carry it, but
where a proposition is submitted to the voters at a general elec-
tion it must receive a majority of all the votes cast at the elec-
tion in order to carry, unless the statute providing for its sub-
mission specifies that a majority of the votes cast upon the par-
ticular proposition shall be sufficient. Under the latter ar-
rangement, the measure is much more apt to carry, since many
voters at a general election fail to vote either for or against
a proposition. The device provided for under the act of 1899,
already noted, whereby public measures submitted to popular
vote are printed on a separate ballot, known as the "little
ballot," also tends to increase the chances of securing a favor-
able vote on the proposition. 51
In addition to the referendum there has also existed in
Illinois since 1901 a public policy law which confers upon the
voters a power somewhat analogous to the initiative in ordi-
nary legislation as found in some other states. Under this law
on a petition signed by twenty-five per cent of the voters of
any political subdivision of the state or ten per cent of the vot-
ers of the whole state, it is the duty of the proper election
officers in each case to submit any question of public policy so
petitioned for to the voters of the subdivision or state respec-
tively at any general or special election named in the petition.
Not more than three propositions may be submitted at the
same election. 52 The petition must be filed not less than sixty
51 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 43, section 25; People ex rel. <v. Weber et
al., 222 Illinois, 180; Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. 971. On this whole
matter see Gardner, " Working of the State-Wide Referendum in Illinois,"
American Political Science Review, 5: 394-415.
52 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, section 428.
days before the election. The purpose of the law is to make it
possible to secure an expression of public opinion as a guide to
the general assembly in the enactment of laws. It does not
follow, however, that because public opinion, as thus expressed,
favors the enactment of a particular law, such law will neces-
sarily be passed by the general assembly. There is no legal
compulsion resting upon it to do so, and no pledge taken by the
members of the legislature to vote in favor of such a law, and,
in practice, most of the propositions favored by public opinion
as expressed under the public policy law, have not been enacted
by the general assembly. It should be added, however, that
several public policy votes related to proposed constitutional
amendments, and consequently could not have been enacted
into law by the legislature.
Among the propositions which have received the approval
of public opinion, as thus expressed, but which have not been
enacted into law by the general assembly, are those for the
popular initiative and referendum, a corrupt practices act, and
a short ballot commission. Neither the referenda mentioned
above nor the power of the people under the public policy law
constitute a real initiative and referendum in ordinary legisla-
tion as found in Oregon and some other states, and there has
been considerable agitation in favor of introducing in this state
the Oregon system of direct legislation. A proposed question
of public policy embodying this system was submitted to the
voters of the state in 1902 and approved by a vote of 428,000
to 88,000. The proposition was again submitted in 1910 and
approved by a vote of 448,000 to 128,000. These repeated
indications, however, of considerable public opinion in favor of
the proposition have thus far borne no fruit in actual legisla-
tion. 53
A proposition was presented to the voters in 1910 under
the public policy law to the effect that the next general assem-
bly should " enact a corrupt practices act, limiting the amount
53 The above figures take into consideration merely those who voted on the
proposition. It should be noted that, in neither case, was the vote in favor of
the proposition equal to a majority of all votes cast at the election.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 377
a candidate and his supporters may spend in seeking office, and
providing for an itemized statement under oath showing all
expenditures so made, for what purposes made and from what
source or sources received, thus preventing the corrupt use of
money at elections." This proposition was approved by a vote
of 422,000 to 122,000. The state platforms of both the lead-
ing parties have contained planks favoring the enactment of a
corrupt practices law. 54 In 1913, Governor Dunne declared
that "candidates have concededly spent in election contests
more than twice the salary they could collect during the whole
term of their offices;" and he recommended the passage of an
act "which will limit, within reasonable restrictions, the ex-
penditure of money during a political campaign, and compel
the publication of all amounts collected and expended both
before and after election." 55 The general assembly, how-
ever, has not yet passed the act suggested. By an act passed
in 1917, however, it is declared unlawful, under penalty of
fine or imprisonment and forfeiture of office for any candidate
for elective office to make any promise or pledge to any person
or organization to further the interests of such person or or-
ganization by his official action or lack of action if elected in
exchange for support at the polls or financial assistance.
Moreover, there are provisions in the election law against
bribery and against electioneering at the polls, and in the civil
service law against political activity on the part of civil serv-
ice employees. The law against bribery, however, merely
makes illegal the taking of bribes, and specifically provides that
the bribe-giver shall not be liable to punishment. 56 This
curious provision of the general election law is also found in
the direct primary statute.
The large number of elections, both primary and general,
held in Illinois places a rapidly increasing burden of expense
54 Chicago City Club Bulletin, 3 : 370.
55 Inaugural Address of Governor Edward F. Dunne before the Forty-Eighth
General Assembly, 8.
56 Laws of 1917, p. 455 ; Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 46, sections 83, 518 ,
Report of the Attorney-General, 1912, p. 417.
378 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
upon the taxpayers. Governor Dunne declared in 1915 that
"in the city of Chicago alone a single primary election costs
$275,000 and a single final election $320, ooo," 57 and Gover-
nor Lowden declares that " the burden of expense which elec-
tions impose is becoming unbearable." 58 The Chicago Bureau
of Public Efficiency, in a report made in 1912, pointed out that
in the period from 1896 to 1912, the annual expenditures for
election purposes in Chicago and Cicero increased from $288,-
281.36 to $911,807.29, or more than three hundred per cent.
In order to lessen election expenses the bureau recommends a
reduction in the number of primaries and elections and urges
especially that city and judicial primaries should be abolished. 59
Governor Dunne, in a special message to an extra session of
the forty-ninth general assembly, quoted the estimate of
County Judge Scully of Cook county that the total expense con-
nected with the holding of elections in Chicago during the year
1916 would reach a total of $2,225,500. This included the
expense of three primary elections, three final elections, and
six registration days, including the canvass of precincts and re-
vision of registration on separate days required by law after
each registration. As a partial remedy for this condition, Gov-
ernor Dunne advocated the consolidation of registration and
primary days. The Legislative Voters League adopted reso-
lutions in 1915 advocating elimination of the pre-presidential
registration; substitution of district or ward registration for
precinct registration for primaries; and combination of the
presidential primary and the city and town elections. 60 Al-
though a reduction in the number and expense is undoubtedly
desirable and even imperative, nevertheless it is generally
agreed that this should not be done in such a way as still fur-
ther to confuse the issues and the voters in elections as might
be the result if the presidential primary and aldermanic elec-
57 Biennial Message of Edward F. Dunne, 7.
58 Inaugural Address of Governor Frank O. Lowden before the Fiftieth
General Assembly, 5.
59 Growing Cost of Elections in Chicago and Cook County, 5.
60 Chicago Tribune, December 16, 1915, January 12, 1916.
SUFFRAGE, PARTIES, ELECTIONS 379
tions were combined. Much of the expense of elections could
be saved in other directions, such as by combining certain local
or nonpartisan elections in which the issues would not be
greatly different, by the introduction of a system of permanent
or central registration, and by abolishing the primary in cer-
tain cases and nominating candidates by petition.
As Governor Lowden pointed out in the inaugural address
above mentioned, the expense of elections " is not the most im-
portant consideration. The lengthening of the ballot and the
increasing frequency of elections are tending to defeat the very
purpose of democracy." This is a serious danger and.is directly
due to the excessive number of elections and of elective officers.
A committee of the Chicago City Club, in a report made in
1912, pointed out that the voter in Illinois is "called upon to
make intelligently and conscientiously all the way from twenty-
five (25) to fifty-five (55) separate decisions at the polls to
pass upon the qualifications of hundreds of men who aspire to
many offices of diverse character." 61 The men's candidate
ballot supplied to voters in Chicago at the general election of
November, 1916, was three feet long and twenty inches wide
and contained about 270 names arranged in six party columns.
In addition, the voter was expected to vote the separate ballot
for judges of the municipal court, containing the names of more
than thirty candidates, and another so-called " little ballot,"
two feet long, containing five propositions two city bond
issues, park consolidation, banking law amendment, and tax
amendment to the constitution.
During the year 1916 the voters of Chicago were expected
to choose or to assist in choosing more than three hundred
different elective officials. To inform himself adequately re-
garding the merits and qualifications of the multitude of candi-
dates is a task which the ordinary busy citizen is unable to per-
form without assistance. The Chicago Municipal Voters
League and the Legislative Voters League are organiza-
tions formed for the purpose of affording this assistance
61 Short Ballot in Illinois, 7.
3 8o THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
and of enabling the voter to cast an intelligent ballot. 62
Ordinarily, however, with regard to most of the candi-
dates for minor and unimportant offices, the voter's only
guide is the party label; and this circumstance tends to induce
him in most cases to vote a straight party ticket by placing a
cross at the top of the party column. Thus, in effect, he abdi-
cates his supposed function of making an intelligent choice be-
tween candidates, and the real control rests in the hands of the
party managers who draw up the party slate. The short ballot
principle requires that the voter should not be expected to vote
for petty- officers, having merely ministerial duties, but only
for a very few of the most important officers, who have some
control over the determination of public policies. The introduc-
tion of the short ballot would not only enable the voter to vote
more intelligently, but would also conduce to a better inte-
grated administrative system.
The management of elections in Illinois is very largely
decentralized; and the expense of holding election, even when
state officers are chosen, is a charge upon the locality. The
state as a whole, however, is interested in the efficient and
orderly management of elections, especially where state officers
are to be chosen. The question may, therefore, in the near
future become acute whether, in all except purely local elec-
tions, the state should not assume at least part of the expense
and undertake the administrative control or supervision of
such elections.
82 Jones, Readings on Parties and Elections, 321.
XVII. THE ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW
A" I A HE efficiency of law enforcement in Illinois is influenced
JL by many factors, such as the character of the law, the
nature of the conditions upon which the law is designed to
operate, and the working of the machinery provided for its
enforcement. The more nearly the laws express the opinion
of the mass of the people, the more likely they are to receive
that support of public opinion which is almost essential to
their enforcement. If the population is fairly homogeneous,
both the demands of public opinion for the enactment of
laws and the support of such opinion in their enforcement is.
other things being equal, more definite and certain than when
the population exhibits a large degree of heterogeneity in race,
color, and literacy. It is therefore of interest in this con-
nection to note that, according to the United States census of
1910, over thirty per cent of the total population of Illinois are
native whites of foreign or mixed parentage, over twenty-one
per cent are foreign born whites and among Negroes the
proportion of illiteracy is more than ten per cent. The foreign
born and Negro population forms a considerably greater per--
centage of the total population in the cities than in the rural
districts. From this great diversity in the composition and
characteristics of the population upon which the laws are de-
signed to operate, it results that the problem of efficient law
enforcement is by no means a simple one.
The efficiency of law enforcement in the state is also influ-
enced by the character of the machinery provided for such
enforcement. In this connection it is to be noted in the first
place that some dependence is placed upon private initiative
to effect this purpose. Thus, the provision of the Illinois
criminal code giving the heirs of a person who has been lynched
381
382 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
a right to an action for damages against the county or city in
which the lynching occurred is an example of the utilization of
private initiative for the purpose of coping indirectly with
criminal lawlessness. 1 The abatement and injunction act of
1915 also invokes private initiative in law enforcement by
giving to any citizen of a county in which a disorderly house
exists a right to maintain a bill in equity perpetually to enjoin
and abate such a nuisance. 2 Such organizations as the
Anti-Saloon League, Law and Order League, Citizens' Asso-
ciation, and similar bodies are examples of private agencies
organized, either primarily or incidentally, for the purpose
of assisting in the enforcement of certain particular laws of
the state. 3
For the most part, however, dependence for law enforce-
ment must, of course, be had upon the regular constituted
officers and authorities established for that purpose, such as
the governor, the courts, the militia, state and local commis-
sioners and inspectors, the attorney-general, the states attor-
neys, sheriffs, mayors, constables, and police. These various
officers do not constitute a unified department of justice for
the state but merely a group of officers and agencies more or
less independent of each other, between whom conflicts, friction,
and lack of cooperation may and sometimes do arise. Thus,
the enforcement of state laws is not infrequently impeded
through the issuance of temporary injnctions by the courts.
Conflicts may arise with respect to the enforcement of anti-
liquor or anti-vice laws between the law-enforcing officers of a
county and of a city located within the county, as well as be-
tween state and local officers. In Cook county there are about
a score of district governing agencies, most of them being
largely independent of each other. Under these circum-
1 Kurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 38, section 2s6w.
2 Laws of 1915, p. 372.
3 In the forty-seventh general assembly a bill was introduced providing an
extension of the quo warranto statute so as to allow any public law-enforcing
official, for example a mayor, to be brought into court on application of a tax-
payer and compelled to show cause why he should not forfeit his office for failure
to enforce existing laws.
ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW 383
stances, conflicts between local law-enforcing officers, such as
mayor and states attorney are the natural result, particularly
when they belong to opposite political parties or factions.
Under the cities and villages act, the mayor has the same
authority as the sheriff to preserve peace and enforce order. 4
If there is an understanding as to a proper delimination of
authority between these officers, this provision may work no
harm; but on general principles it is not usually wise to intrust
the same functions to be exercised by separate and independent
officials in the same territory. The result of such a provision
may sometimes be that responsibility is divided, and an oppor-
tunity is afforded whereby local officials may engage in the
unedifying pastime of "passing the buck" in an attempt to
shift responsibility for lawless conditions.
Dependence in the first instance for the enforcement of
state law rests upon local officers, sheriffs, constables, states
attorneys, mayors, and police. Direct action by state authori-
ties takes place ordinarily only when local authorities fail or
are unable to cope with the existing lawlessness. In legal
theory, sheriffs, states attorneys, and police are state officers; 5
but, for practical purposes, they bear more nearly the character
of local officers, because they are, for the most part, subject to
local control only. Under these circumstances, such officers
are naturally influenced in enforcing state law by public senti-
ment in their respective localities; and if such sentiment is very
strongly opposed to a particular state law, that law is not
likely to be very strictly enforced. Thus the system of de-
pending upon local officers for the enforcement of state law
may bring about a species of extralegal home rule in the
localities. The exercise by localities within the state of the
dispensing power may result in the practically open defiance of
state law. In 1874, the Chicago city council repealed the
Sunday closing ordinance which Mayor Medill had attempted
to enforce. This action of the council was a virtual notice
4 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 24, section 21.
5 City of Chicago v, Wright, 69 Illinois, 318 (326).
384 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
to the state that there was no intention on the part of the city
government to enforce the state law in that city. The council
flung down the gauntlet to the state, but the challenge was not
accepted, and the state has weakly contented itself with a policy
of inaction, neither repealing the law nor providing any effec-
tive means for its enforcement. What virtually amounts to a
referendum on the question of the enforcement of the state
law requiring the closing of saloons on Sunday has been af-
forded in recent mayoral campaigns in Chicago, for certain
candidates have virtually pledged themselves to disregard this
law if elected. A former mayor of Chicago has publicly
declared that during more than twenty years while he and
his father occupied the mayoral chair of Chicago, they
had both construed the Sunday closing law in that city as
a dead letter, believing that their attitude represented the
majority sentiment of the community. 6 Practically, there-
fore, the state law was nullified, and an extralegal form of
local option or home rule was afforded the city with respect
to this law.
Several years ago, States Attorney Healey of Cook county
attempted to enforce this law and tried many cases, but was
unable to secure a single conviction because the juries either
disagreed or acquitted the defendants in the face of almost
conclusive evidence. In this, as in many other cases, the jury
system has operated as an effective barrier to prevent the en-
forcement of a state law in a community to the majority of
whose people the law is obnoxious. The effectiveness of the
jury system as a weapon of defense against the enforcement of
a state law, which is obnoxious to a particular locality, is espe-
cially noteworthy in Illinois, on account of the antiquated
provision that, in criminal cases, the jury shall be the judge
both of the law and the facts. In this connection, it may be
noted that the injunction and abatement law enacted in 1915
derives much of its effectiveness from the fact that it dispenses
with the necessity for jury trial in cases involving the suppres-
6 Chicago Tribune, October 18, 1915.
ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW 385
sion of disorderly houses and substitutes therefor the action of
the equity branch of the courts. 7
The nonenforcement of state law in particular localities
may sometimes be brought about not only through the practical
dispensing power of local officers in regard to such law or
through the failure of juries to convict, but also through the
formal action of local units of government. Thus, in Decem-
ber, 1911, the people of Springfield voted on the question of
Sunday closing of dramshops on a referendum provided under
the commission form of government act. By a vote of two
to one they formally decided that the Sunday closing ordinance
should not be enforced in that city. On the day after the elec-
tion the State Register said: "By a decisive vote the four
ordinances submitted to the will of the people were defeated
yesterday .... by the voters who are the supreme authority
of this municipality." 8 This statement, while seeming to
ignore the legal supremacy of the state over the municipality,
is doubtless to a certain extent in accordance with conditions
which frequently exist.
With respect to state laws the enforcement of which in
certain localities is opposed by a considerable element of the
population therein, the state might adopt one of three possible
courses: first, repeal the laws by formal legislative action, or
secondly, allow the localities, in a regular and legal manner,
the option as to whether or not such laws shall be enforced
within their boundaries, or, thirdly, retain the laws upon the
statute books, but provide adequate machinery for their en-
forcement. 9 The old saying, attributed to General Grant,
that the way to secure the repeal of an obnoxious law is to
7 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 38, section 431; Laws of Illinois, 1915, p.
371, upheld as constitutional by the decision in People v. Smith, 275 Illinois, 256.
A bill was introduced in the fiftieth general assembly providing for the removal
from office of any county or municipal officer for misfeasance, malfeasance, or non-
feasance through the filing of a petition in the circuit court by the attorney-
general, states attorney or by any five qualified electors of the county, but it
failed of passage.
8 Illinois State Register, December 15, 1911. The italics are mine.
9 Mathews, " Law Enforcement and Home Rule," Proceedings of the Third
Annual Convention of the Illinois Municipal League, 43-54.
3 86 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
enforce it rigidly does not apply to a situation where a law is
obnoxious to some localities only, but the power of repeal can
not be exercised except by the authority of the entire state. On
the other hand, formal repeal of such laws is seldom seriously
considered as a practical measure, partly because this would
constitute a tacit admission of the state's inability to enforce
them with the existing machinery, and partly because such ac-
tion would be distasteful to the large number of people who
still desire to retain such laws on the statute books as a matter
of principle.
The second possible course of action with regard to the
enforcement of state laws, that of local option, represents an
effort to adjust such laws to the sentiments and wishes of the
majority of particular localities. In practice local option does
not, of course, imply that certain state laws may be suspended
in particular localities (though the result is practically the
same), but that the law as applied to certain political subdivi-
sions may be altered by a vote of the people of such subdivi-
sion. Under the cities and villages act the city council in the
cities and the president and board of trustees in villages have
the option of licensing, regulating or prohibiting the sale of
intoxicating liquor within their jurisdictions. This, however,
gave the people of such subdivisions no power of directly
deciding by vote the question of license or no license. In 1907,
however, this power was extended to the voters of any town,
precinct, city, or village. The law requires that, upon the
filing of a petition signed by at least one-fourth of the legal
voters of such political subdivision who voted at the previous
election, the question of prohibiting the sale of intoxicating
liquor shall be submitted at the next election, and if the major-
ity of the voters voting on the proposition vote "yes," the
political subdivision becomes anti-saloon territory, in which
the issuance of licenses for the sale of intoxicating liquor be-
comes illegal. As a result of the operation of this law, a
considerable portion of the territory of the state has become
" dry," but the largest cities, such as Chicago, Peoria, and East
ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW 387
St. Louis, still remain "wet." Some question may arise as to
what local subdivisions should be given the power of deciding
this question. The anti-saloon forces have advocated that
the law be changed so as to provide for county option. Some
persons even advocate state wide prohibition by state authority,
but public opinion does not appear to be ready to sanction this
extreme step. In 1913, however, the legislature enacted the
" four-mile law," which prohibits absolutely the sale, keeping
for sale, distribution, or delivery of any intoxicating liquor
within four miles of the main campus of the state university.
No special state machinery, however, was provided for the
enforcement of the law. 10
In the case of a number of state laws, experience has shown
that the placing of dependence entirely upon local officials for
their enforcement almost inevitably results in lax or non-
enforcement in many localities. In 1894, Governor Altgeld,
in protesting against the action of President Cleveland in send-
ing federal troops into this state to enforce federal law, main-
tained that such action was a violation of the fundamental
principle of local self-government. Opposition to state inter-
ference in the localities to enforce state law has sometimes
been based on the same ground. Local sentiment does not
readily tolerate complete state centralization of law enforce-
ment in the localities. It seems evident, however, that for the
regular and permanent enforcement of state law, some state
machinery of enforcement is needed in addition to the power of
the governor to call out the state militia. If the state is in
earnest in the enforcement of its laws, it is practically necessary
in many cases that the state should definitely assume the re-
sponsibility for such enforcement by providing some special
machinery to that end, preferably of an extra-local or state
character. Such special machinery has to some extent been
supplied in Ilinois. By an act of 1905 to "suppress mob
violence," it was provided that a county or city shall be liable
10 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 24, section 62, paragraph 46 ; ibid., chap-
ter 43, section 25 was upheld as constitutional in People <v. McBride, 234 Illinois,
146; Laws of Illinois, 1913, p. 306.
3 88 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
in damages to a person, or his legal representative, who has
been injured therein in person or property by mob violence. 11
Thus there is the possibility of a civil suit for damages against
the local political subdivision with the resulting possibility of an
increase in the tax rate, in addition to the possibility of a crim-
inal prosecution. Although this act has been invoked on sev-
eral occasions, it is doubtful whether it has had any very appre-
ciable effect in deterring acts of violence.
A somewhat more important provision is contained in an-
other section of the same act, which provides that if a prisoner
is taken from the custody of a sheriff and lynched, the governor
is authorized by proclamation to declare the office vacant and
the coroner immediately succeeds thereto. 12 The principle of
administrative control embodied in this act represents a step in
the direction of greater efficiency in law enforcement, but the
operation of the principle is narrowly restricted, for the supe-
rior administrative control is not capable of exercise in a general
way but only under a given set of circumstances which is of
comparatively rare occurrence.
The constitution imposes upon the governor the duty of
taking care that the laws are faithfully executed, but he is
vested with comparatively little control over the officers upon
whom he must largely depend for the execution of the laws. 13
The governor, however, as the most conspicuous officer in the
state, can occasionally accomplish something in the direction
of law enforcement through the publicity which attaches to his
words and actions. Governors of Illinois have not infre-
quently written public letters to sheriffs calling upon them to
remedy or prevent lawless conditions in their counties and
thereby calling public attention to such conditions. If the
11 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 38, sections 2$6v, 256w. This act sup-
plemented the somewhat similar act of 1887, under which it was held that the
city is liable for damages even when unable to prevent the violence; City o
Chicago v. Sturges, 222 United States, 313.
12 The sheriff may be reinstated upon showing that he did all in his power
to protect the prisoner. This act was attacked on the ground that the legislature
had no power to authorize the governor to remove an elective officer, but it was
upheld as constitutional by People <v. Nellis, 249 Illinois, 12.
13 Article v, section 6.
ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW 389
governor is the recognized leader of his party in the state and
the sheriff belongs to the same party, the directions of the
governor will naturally have an added effect. Ordinarily,
however, the sheriff may ignore with impunity the instructions
of the governor.
The authority of the governor in securing the enforcement
of the laws rests, in last resort, upon his constitutional position
as commander-in-chief of the state militia, consisting of all
able-bodied male citizens of the state between the ages of
eighteen and forty-five, with a few exceptions. The militia is
partly organized into a " National Guard," but the governor
may, by proclamation, call out the unorganized militia and
organize it. In exercising his control over the organized
militia, the governor ordinarily acts through the adjutant
general, who is appointed by him. The purposes for which
the governor may call out the military forces of the state are
to execute the laws, suppress insurrection, and repel invasion.
Under the bill of rights of the constitution, the military power
is required to be in strict subordination to the civil power, and,
in insuring this condition, the legislature has provided that
when the military forces are ordered out on the application of
the sheriff or other civil officer, they shall report to and act in
subordination to such civil officer as the governor may desig-
nate. Such subordination, however, consists only in obeying
the orders of the civil authority as to the objects to be attained
and not as to the methods to be employed in attaining such
ends. 14
In practice, the militia is utilized as a law-enforcing agency
only on extraordinary occasions, such as where the local author-
ities are unable to cope with the lawless element in the com-
munity. In considering the power of the governor to enforce
the dramshop act, Attorney-General Stead held in 1905 that
"The enforcement of police law does not belong to the Gov-
ernor, as the chief executive officer of the State, but belongs to
the officers elected for that purpose in conformity with the
14 Hurd's Revised Statutes, chapter 38, section 256111, chapter 129, sections 3, 207.
390 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
provision of the Constitution. The Constitution does, how-
ever, contemplate that when the regular administration of the
law through the courts of justice is interrupted by violence or
civil commotion the Governor may, by the military arm of the
government, enforce the law. Until such event occurs the law
is enforceable in the regular way, through the courts, and the
Governor has nothing to do with its enforcement except where
that duty shall be especially enjoined upon him, either by the
Constitution or by some statute." 15 The power of the gov-
ernor to call out the militia, however, may be exercised in his
discretion whenever in his judgment the occasion demands it
even though he has not been requested to do so by the sheriff
or other officer. In practice, however, the governor does not
usually call out the militia except in response to a request from
the regular law-enforcing officers. Attorney-General Stead, in
the opinion cited above, also intimated that the constitution
and statutes do not contemplate any interference on the part
of the governor if local officers should merely refuse or neglect
to enforce the law, but only where civil commotion renders
them unable to enforce it. There would seem to be no ques-
tion, however, as to the governor's power to interfere in either
case for the purpose of enforcing the law through military
force.
The use of the militia, as a law-enforcing agency has often
been of great value in protecting life and property. Experi-
ence in other states has shown, however, that there might be
some advantages in retaining the militia as a reserve force to
be used in the national defense and creating an additional
agency of a more permanent, regular, and professional char-
acter to assist, supervise, or displace local authorities in the
enforcement of state laws. The need of such a permanent
agency or force was illustrated in 1917 by the disturbances
incident to the race riots in East St. Louis. This need has
also become more acute on account of the mustering of the
15 Report of Attorney-General of Illinois, 1905-1906, p. 371-372; Report and
Opinions of Attorney-General, 1913, p. 81-83; City of Chicago <v. Chicago League
Ball Club, 196 Illinois, 54.
ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW 391
state militia into federal service for war purposes. 16 In other
states, attempts have been made to secure better law enforce-
ment either by the creation of a state constabulary primarily
for the purpose of enforcing state law in the rural districts, or
by the establishment of state supervision of metropolitan police
forces.
An important and forcible recommendation for the estab-
lishment of a state constabulary was made by the grand jury
which investigated the East St. Louis riots, as follows: "We
recommend to the governor and state legislature of Illinois
that, in order to be on constant guard against such disasters,
there be established by law a state police force or constabulary,
partly mounted, and that this police force be a permanent body
of 1,000 or more trained policemen on constant duty, to be
moved in sections from one place in the state to another to
enforce all law. If a portion of this constabulary were
brought from a distant part of the state, they would not be
affected by local prejudices and opinions. Each of these state
constables should be given all the powers throughout the state
that the sheriff of the county has in his own cqunty and police
of every section of the state under the direction and authority
of his honor the governor." 17
In the cities, the feeling in favor of the maintenance of the
principles of home rule is probably stronger than in the rural
districts; and moreover the cities are usually better policed by
their local constabularies than are the rural districts. The
principle of home rule requires that the city police should be
appointed, officered, and governed by local authorities. To
the extent that the functions of the city police consist in the
enforcement of local ordinances, there is no demand that the
principle of home rule should be infringed. But city police
are also charged with the enforcement of state laws. The
16 An act of the fiftieth general assembly authorizes the governor to organize
volunteer companies to constitute a reserve militia. See Laws of 1917, p. 782. In
pursuance of this authorization, Governor Lowden issued in September, 1917, a
proclamation calling for six thousand volunteers. Chicago Herald, September
ao, 1917-.
17 Ibid., August 15, 1917.
392 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
latter functions might be transferred to state controlled agents
if experience shows that the locally controlled police cannot be
depended upon to perform them, or else the city police might
be placed under state supervision. The state might set up a
standard of efficiency for municipal police forces and exact a
penalty from those cities whose forces fall below that standard,
while granting aid to those whose forces meet or surpass such
standard. For a short time during the Civil War, the police
of Chicago were under state control. From time to time
since then, as in 1897 and 1913, bills have been introduced in
the general assembly, providing for the establishment of a
state board of police commissioners to control or supervise
city police forces, but have failed of passage. In calling the
special session of 18971898, Governor Tanner stated that
one of the measures which the legislature should take up was
an act establishing metropolitan police boards in cities of over
one hundred thousand population, in other words, a state police
board appointed by the governor, which would control the
police department in Chicago. The governor stated that he
included the subject of a police board because he wanted to
see the police force of Chicago taken entirely out of politics.
To many persons, however, this seemed to be a move to trans-
fer the control of the Chicago police from the dominant party
in the city to the dominant party in the state. It was attacked
as weakening the municipal civil service system and as being a
violation of the principle of home rule, and was finally allowed
to drop. 18
In 1913, another attempt was made to take the police
department of Chicago out of the hands of the mayor and the
city administration through a bill providing a state board of
police commissioners for cities having a population of more
than one hundred thousand. The members of the commission
were to have complete control of the city police department
and were to be appointed by the governor for three-year terms.
The act was not to go into effect with respect to any city, how*
18 Laws of 1861, p. 151 ; Chicago Tribune, December 4, 1897.
ENFORCEMENT OF STATE LAW 393
ever, except after a referendum vote of the qualified voters of
the city. In describing the purpose of the bill, the author,
Senator Clark, said: "My bill is modeled after the present
Massachusetts law. You don't hear of police scandals in
that state. You d'o not hear, as in Chicago, that because some
lawbreaker in a ward is protected by an alderman or a political
boss a policeman refrains from arresting him and a police cap-
tain hesitates to enforce the law. We have got to take the
police department of Chicago out of politics if we expect to
have an efficient force." 10 The measure, however, failed to
become a law. Another bill was introduced in the fiftieth general
assembly in 1917 providing for the establishment of a state
police department to be under the management of a board
of four commissioners of state police, to be appointed by the
governor. In enforcing state laws, the department was to
have the same powers as sheriffs, police, or constables. This
bill was backed by the Chicago Law and Order League and was
designed to furnish a means whereby the governor may take a
hand in a local situation involving vice, gambling, and liquor
law violations when the states attorney, sheriff, or mayor fails
to act. It, however, also failed of passage.
The problem of the efficient enforcement of state law in
the localities of Illinois is still largely unsolved. The generally
law-abiding character of the people and a conservatism about
entering upon governmental experiments have hitherto pre-
vented any very determined steps toward its solution. As the
problem becomes more acute, however, it will doubtless become
necessary for the state authorities and the people to apply more
thought to this problem and resolutely take such steps as may
be adequate to meet it. Such progress in this direction as has
already been made in Illinois, as well as the experience of other
states, indicates that the most effective means available to this
end will consist in the establishment of central administrative
agencies, not only for the supervision of local law-enforcing
officers, but also for the direct enforcement of state law.
19 Chicago Record-Herald, January 13, 1913.
XVIII. THE PANIC OF 1893 AND THE BANKS
THE prosperity of the people of Illinois received a severe
shock in 1893 when a general crisis interrupted the finan-
cial, commercial, and industrial development of the state.
Probably in no state in the union were the effects of this panic
more far-reaching, and certainly in no city were they attended
with more suffering than in Chicago. Any account of the
industrial and financial progress of the state during this period
must therefore begin with this event.
The causes of the panic of 1893 were deep-seated and com-
plex and must be sought in national and even international
events, running back at least as far as 1890. But back of all
contributary factors lay the fundamental cause of all panics
unwise speculation and in this the west shared largely.
A decade of unexampled prosperity and expansion had tempted
to unwise investment and extravagant expenditure. The storm
had been sown and the whirlwind was now reaped. As the
financial, commercial, and industrial development of Illinois
had been especially rapid during the previous period, so now
the people were called upon to pay in equal measure.
The panic was precipitated, as is not uncommon in such
events, by the failure of a few large institutions. In Chicago
the first shock came with the failure of the Chemical National
Bank of that city, with a capital of $1,000,000, which closed
its doors on May 9, and was followed two days later by the
Columbia National Bank of Chicago, with a similar capital-
ization. 1 The smaller cities of the state were less affected
than Chicago, though other failures which occurred during this
month were those of the Evanston National Bank, with a
capital of $100,000, and the First National Bank of Kankakee,
1 Conant, History of Modern Banks of Issue, 674.
394
THE PANIC OF 1893 395
with a capital of $50,000, but the latter was restored to sol-
vency before the end of the year. 2 These suspensions were
followed by the collapse of three private banks. On June 5
there occurred a run upon a number of savings banks of Chi-
cago, involving eight state banks. In order to reassure the
public as to the solvency of the state banks the auditor at once
ordered these institutions to furnish and publish statements
of their condition on the morning of June 5. These state-
ments showed that the banks were sound and prevented the
further spread of the panic at this time. 3 As the savings
deposits in forty-four state banks at this time totaled about
twenty million dollars, and as these banks were at the same
time conducting a commercial banking business, it is clear
that any wholesale withdrawal of these deposits would have
affected seriously the condition of the banks throughout the
state.
In May the panic became acute and spread over the whole
country. The stock market experienced a severe crash in that
month, but a more serious one occurred in July. Money rates
rose to abnormal heights and many holders of securities were
forced to unload at low prices. The situation was aggravated
by the banking practice of the time, according to which the
reserves of the country banks were heaped up in New York
City. In order to protect themselves the interior banks began
to call in their deposits in cash from New York and other
reserve cities. While the New York City banks lost heavily,
the country banks, as in 1873, positively increased their cash
holdings. Though the banks of Chicago experienced some
loss, they were able by calling in their loans to increase slightly
the proportion of cash to net deposits. 4 Thus the loans of the
Chicago national banks were reduced $4,000,000 between
March 6 and May 4. Between May 4 and July 1 2 loans were
reduced from $96,000,000 to $82,000,000, the net deposits
from $99,600,000 to $81,300,000, and the cash reserves from
2 Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, 1893, i : 75-76.
8 Auditor's Report, 1895, p. x.
* Sprague, History of Crises under the National Banking System, 174.
396 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
$29,300,000 to $24,900,000; but the ratio of reserve to liabili-
ties was raised slightly from twenty-nine and four-tenths to
thirty and six-tenths. By October 4, the loans had been still
further reduced to $73,500,000. Contraction in loans by the
banks was a general and striking feature of this panic. Be-
tween May 4 and October 4 the loans of all the national banks
in the United States were reduced fourteen and seven-tenths
per cent, but the reduction of the Chicago banks during this
period was twenty-six and seven-tenths per cent.
During the first eight months of 1893 twenty-four banks
other than national were reported by the comptroller to have
failed in Illinois; of these one was a mortgage and investment
company, with assets of $50,000 and liabilities of $70,000, and
twenty-three were private banks with assets of $4,041,027
and liabilities of $5,056,813. No state banks, savings banks,
or trust companies went down in this period. During the
year September i, i893~August 31, 1894, only four bank
failures were reported in the state; these were all private
banks, with assets amounting to $423,000 and liabilities of
$534,ooo. 5
One cause of banking failures was the distrust of the banks
and the withdrawal of deposits by frightened depositors. In
not a few instances country banks were forced to suspend at
a time when their own cash reserves were on the way to them
from the reserve city banks. 6 The wholesale withdrawal of
their cash reserves by western institutions so depleted the east-
ern banks that by the end of June these were forced to issue
clearing house certificates. This had been done in 1873 an d
1884, but was now resorted to on a much larger scale. The
cities of New York, Boston, Philadelphia-, Baltimore, and
Pittsburg issued a total of $63,152,000 during the year 1893.*
" Chicago, however, where a strong local prejudice exists
5 Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, 1893, 1:209.
6 Noyes, "The Banks and the Panic of 1893," Political Science Quarterly,
9:18. Mr. Noyes argued that if the western and southern banks had kept their
own cash reserves they would in most cases have been able to maintain their
solvency.
7 Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, 1893, 1:16-
THE PANIC OF 1893 397
against the plan, refused to follow." 8 To be sure the Chi-
cago clearing house had authorized on July 26, for the first
time in its history, the issue of clearing house loan certificates, 9
but no bank availed itself of their use.
"The result," wrote A. D. Noyes, 10 "was exactly what
might have been foreseen. In the Eastern cities the use
of loan certificates so far offset the violent shrinkage in re-
serves, that between May 4 and July 12 the loan account of
the New York national banks actually increased; the loans of
Philadelphia were cut down only two per cent, and those of
Boston only four per cent. But Chicago, lacking the emergency
provision of the Eastern clearing houses, was forced to reduce
its loans no less than fifteen per cent. 11 In a city where local
enterprises were already inflated by speculation incident to"
the World's Fair, the result of this contraction was a col-
lapse more violent than that of any other large commercial
centre."
While they did not resort to the use of clearing house cer-
tificates the Chicago banks endeavored to strengthen their
reserves by the direct importation of gold from abroad. " In-
stead of disposing of commercial bills to foreign exchange
houses in New York, they were used to secure gold in London,
which was shipped directly to the various banks engaging in
the operation." 12
These heavy imports of gold were also in part due to the
low prices of wheat and the consequent large export of wheat
and flour. On January 2, 1894, number 2 red winter wheat
sold at 65.5 cents, against 79.75 cents on the same date in 1893,
and 104.75 cents * in 1892. In some parts of the west farmers
8 Noyes, " The Banks and the Panic of 1893," Political Science Quarterly,
9:21.
9 Cannon, " Clearing Houses," Senate Documents, 61 congress, 2 session,
number 491, p. 121.
10 Noyes, " The Banks and the Panic of 1893," Political Science Quarterly,
9:22.
11 The contraction of loans in Chicago was far more violent in July and in
August, dates not covered by the national reports. The Chicago banks publish
no statements, except when called for by government authorities.
12 Sprague, History of Crises under the National Banking System, 194.
398
sold wheat as low as thirty-five cents a bushel. 13 The already
low prices were aggravated by the collapse of the Chicago
wheat corner in August, 1893, which let prices fall below the
lowest previous record. Another Chicago corner, this time in
provisions, run by the same parties as that in wheat, collapsed
with the failure of the clique, and brought the prices of hog
products down to a level almost as low as that of wheat, lead-
ing to large exportation of these also. 14
Not only were foreign exchanges interfered with, but the
domestic exchanges also were thoroughly disorganized; and
exchange on New York was at a discount in Chicago during all
of August, reaching $30 per one thousand on August 12.
" Chicago packers and grain shippers," announced one of the
leading financial journals, 15 " selling to interior eastern points,
having been unable to sell their New York exchange, are order-
ing the currency to pay for stuff shipped direct by express, thus
doing away with banks."
The effects of the crisis upon the industries of the country
were soon evident. Railway gross earnings showed a loss for
July and continued to register losses during the rest of the year.
The general situation, which was typical of Illinois, was de-
scribed as follows in the Chronicle: 16
" The month of August will long remain memorable as one
of the most remarkable in our industrial history. Never be-
fore has there been such a sudden and striking cessation of
industrial activity. Nor was any section of the country exempt
from the paralysis; mills, factories, furnaces, mines nearly
everywhere shut down in large numbers, and commerce and
enterprise were arrested in an extraordinary and unprecedented
degree. The complete unsettlement of confidence and the
derangement of our financial machinery, which made it almost
impossible to obtain loans or sell domestic exchange, and which
13 Financial Review, 1894, p. 3.
14 Pierce, " A Review of Finance and Business," Bankers' Magazine, 48: 184,
185.
15 Bradstre et's, 21: 511.
16 Commercial and Financial Chronicle, 56:466.
THE PANIC OF 1893 399
put money to a premium over checks, had the effect of stopping
the wheels of industry and of contracting production and con-
sumption within the narrowest limits, so that our internal trade
was reduced to very small proportions in fact was brought
almost to a standstill and hundreds of thousands of men
thrown out of employment."
The production of both coal and iron, usually considered
the barometers of trade, showed marked declines; the output
of pig iron in Illinois fell off more than one-half from 949,450
long tons in 1892 to, 405,261 in i893. 17 New railway con-
struction almost ceased, that for the year 1893 being only
2,549 miles for the whole United States, and 78 for Illinois.
One-fourth of the capitalization of the railways in the country
was in the hands of receivers, among which were several roads
which served Chicago, as the Erie, Northern Pacific, and Union
Pacific. The railways situated within the state of Illinois,
however, fared rather better than the average in this respect,
for while the dividends paid by all railroads in the country fell
off $324,731 below those of 1892, those in Illinois increased
somewhat. 18
Another trustworthy index of the prosperity or depression
of a period is the number of business failures. There was a
fifty per cent increase in the number of failures between 1892
and 1893 from 226 to 566 in the state of Illinois, which
was about the same rate as in the country as a whole. But
the growth in the amount of liabilities was startling from
$2,651,638 to $18,777,462. Against the liabilities, however,
were listed assets of $20,358,615, which was a better showing
than that made by any other state except Wisconsin, and much
better than that for the country as a whole. Most of these
failures occurred in mercantile and commercial enterprises
rather than in manufacturing establishments. 19 The following
table gives the statistics of business failures in Illinois from
1893 to 1916:
17 Financial Review, 1894, p. 5.
18 Poor's Manual, 1895, p. xiv.
19 Report of R. G. Dun and Company, quoted in Financial Review, 1894, p. 18.
400 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
^so_ Osoo P^so^ O N O_ *
tC in w" ^f so" 11" i-T pT to to
r~ T^OO w N to M so vo oo
^ M so OsNso N to PI to
** f.
O PJ_ N O^SO_
pfoo" to nT rf so" O"
-(- t^, -*- M vo
O^O t^oo
Tj-u-vO\iH
oo M uivo
O\t>.cT r >i
,4-HUlN
t~.nN O
N N to os
n- N M
Ooo *J-oo O p O *> f- O
N O OO l~-/3 oo ^OsON
OMX. O .J- H -f + M
Tj-oo^ o *_ "^oo o ^r v o
nT tooo" w''
t^XIcCOO U^^fOVN N '*"-! M Ot^M
tOOO ,4- tO tOOO w CN O WOO tOOC ON 10
t
O ^(^0 rf-wvOOO N OtnosO O OOO^O t^Ov'l-N >^vo \o
M ^^ o_v N * cooo ^O "i-pi^o t^totoN'O.'oioto ^t;^ "^
tf')At'x.<f*ftotoooosinpfpfpfd~*fo^>*t' uioo" tC rl-
oopoooovO
Ovoo VO <ro\O N
ososN
M M \o
ft
P'oo to'O N Os>HOOSOOO NOO J-t^OSO ^toi-OO JJ^O
^ tooo" OS i ^ *^ t? W ^* *^
M
PI Ost^osoo Kitooo N '^^~oosp o^osQso too (^Noooo
SO *OOO OOtoOsOONiQ'TO to uO M ^t"OO ^t" i Os i Pj tl
rC proo" ^T to tCso" i-T to i oo o^oo"so N M" o to os N oo
t^ rr Os os os^o t^ptoo too **-r^O to^-r-.ou^ t^so
txoin MOtoOO^to osso rhoo o i oo O M ^
IH MP|MMH)MMMp|*1 II M
so t^so O to n Os to M oo hxso O to^pj opj Otowso
\O t^OO MOsOsOsQN'-'iOs txoo OOnOOsOOsOtO
to -4- Aiso r~-oo o\ o " pi to TJ- xAi\o tioo oV d * P< to $
OsOsOsOsOsOsUsOOOOOOOOOO'-'-i'-''-''-'
to
THE PANIC OF 1893 401
The crisis of 1893 was followed by a prolonged period of
depression in the industrial, commercial, and financial world,
which continued until 1898. The number of business failures
continued to increase until they reached their climax in 1896.
After this they remained upon a permanently higher level,
due to the growth of the business activities within the state.
The year 1894 saw no such buoyant reaction from the
panic of the previous year as was hoped might assert itself.
Instead, it was filled with disturbing events which served only
to deepen the gloom. Perhaps the most important obstacle to
a business revival was the state of the national finances. 21
Doubt as to the ability of the government to maintain the
gold standard affected foreign trade adversely and halted busi-
ness recovery at home. Another disturbing element was the
necessity of reforming the tariff. All these general influences
were felt in Illinois as elsewhere in the country. There were
others, however, more local in their operation, which affected
conditions in this state more directly.
Manufacturers, menaced by the proposed reduction of
import duties and a shrinking demand, curtailed production or
in some instances closed their factories. The production of
the mines fell off. Railway traffic and freight receipts de-
clined, and new construction ceased. This meant a lessened
demand for rails and structural iron and the steel manufac-
turers reduced their output. Thus a vicious circle of lessened
demand and reduced supply was created which reacted severely
upon the wage earners.
With the failure of so many businesses many persons were
thrown out of work, and the problem of the unemployed soon
became a serious one. Unemployed operatives crowded the
21 Extravagant expenditures a legacy from a more prosperous period
and the reduction of revenue left the treasury with insufficient funds for ordinary
expenses. It, therefore, drew upon the gold reserve fund, which had been set
aside for the redemption of the greenbacks. But at the same time there was a
large export movement in gold $81,200,351 net in 1894 most of which was
also drawn from the dwindling treasury reserve. This created an impossible
drain which was met from the sale of bonds by the federal government to a
total amount for the year of $100,000,000.
402 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
streets of the cities demanding work or food, while other
laborers from farm and mining districts flocked to the towns
and added to the distress there. In no city was the suffering
greater than in Chicago, where the boom period of the World's
Fair had attracted a large number of workers, who now were
left by the prostration of the city's industries without employ-
ment or the prospect of any. Relief agencies came promptly
and nobly to the rescue and did much to alleviate the general
distress, but it was long before a full resumption of activity
restored industry to a condition of prosperity and gave to
labor opportunity for legitimate employment.
Labor troubles arose out of the depression in trade, and
in turn operated to intensify that depression. Such disorders
generally follow financial collapse and industrial prostration,
as had been the case in 1873 an d 1884. But in 1894 there
were times when the industrial unrest assumed almost the pro-
portions of anarchy. In April a strike of the bituminous coal
miners in the middle states occurred against a reduction in
wages and was joined in by between one hundred and fifty and
two hundred thousand men before it was ended in June. Mean-
time it resulted in such a lack of fuel that many industrial estab-
lishments were forced to shut down, and even the railroads in
some instances found it difficult to run their trains. 22
This was but a prelude, however, to the bitter and historic
railway strike which occurred in June and July of this year.
Beginning with a demand on the part of the employees of the
Pullman Palace Car Company for a restoration of wages, the
strike soon spread to all railways handling Pullman cars, under
the direction of the American Railway Union. Interference
with mail cars soon led to the intervention of the federal gov-
ernment and the use of armed troops. The strike was finally
broken and the men returned to work defeated. 23 But the
social, political, and industrial effects of these weeks of strife
were felt for years afterwards.
22 Financial Review, 1895, p. i.
23 See above, chapter via.
THE PANIC OF 1893 403
In addition to trade depression, tariff legislation, and labor
troubles, the year 1894 was one of agricultural disaster to the
country as a whole. The corn crop of the United States was
only 1,200 million bushels, as against 1,600 in 1892 and 1893,
and 2,000 in 1891. Illinois, however, was more fortunate
than its western neighbors, Iowa, Kansas, and Nebraska, where
the crop was almost a total failure, for its yield increased over
the two previous years though it did not approach the banner
record of i89i. 24 The wheat crop was exceptionally large for
1894, being over double what it was in 1893 an d almost up to
the record yield of 1891, but unfortunately the price fell to ab-
normally low levels owing to bumper crops in Europe, and
wheat sold for only forty-three cents a bushel on the farm,
which is the lowest price ever recorded by the state board of
agriculture. This was less than corn brought during certain
months of the year. The crop of oats was exceptionally large
and brought fair prices. 25
The shortage of crops throughout the country, even though
not so marked in Illinois, affected the railways, the ware-
houses, and the milling interests adversely; in all of these re-
spects Illinois suffered. The receipts of grain at Chicago fell
off from 222,870,166 bushels in 1893 to ^8,575, 748 in 1894,
the greatest decline being in corn. Flour and pork receipts
also showed a decline, though the number of live hogs and
cattle somewhat increased. On the whole, however, there was
a decrease in the shipments below those of 1893 and even
more decidedly below those of 1891 and 1892. The produc-
tion of pig iron increased from 405,261 long tons in 1893 to
604,795 m X 894, but this latter figure was lower than any of
the three previous years. 26
A perusal of contemporary financial and trade journals
leaves a strong impression that the most potent influence oper-
ating to retard a complete resumption of normal economic
24 Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture, 1893, 1894.
25 Statistical Report of the Illinois Board of Agriculture, August i, 1915, p.
4; Farmers' Bulletin, 1894.
26 Financial Review, 1896, p. 27, 64.
4 o 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
activities was the uncertainty which still prevailed as to federal
financial and monetary legislation. While the administration,
by the bond syndicate loan of 1895, had shown its determina-
tion to maintain the gold standard at all hazards, the year
1896 witnessed a determined assault upon this standard by one
of the political parties. Not until a further loan of $100,000,-
ooo had placed the national finances and the gold reserve upon
a safe basis, and the election in November had definitely and
finally decided the question as to the maintenance of the gold
standard, did the country begin to recover from the depres-
sion which characterized these years.
An even more fundamental factor in determining the pros-
perity of an agricultural state like Illinois was the well-being
of the farmers. Large crops, especially of corn, were obtained
in both 1895 and 1896, but this advantage was offset by
ruinously low prices. The prices obtained in 1896 for corn
(17 cents per bushel) and for oats (13 cents) were the lowest
ever recorded in the fifty-eight years from 1860 to 1917, and
that for wheat (48 cents) was the lowest with one exception
in this period. 27
Iron production for 1895 had shown a sixty per cent in-
crease over the low output of 1894 and was maintained during
1896 almost at the high level of the previous year, but here
too prices were unsatisfactory and were downward until toward
the end of the year, when there was a marked revival. The
following year (1897) saw the production of pig iron in Illi-
nois raised to the highest amount yet recorded, namely, 1,117,-
239 long tons. This was in spite of a serious strike of the
coal miners during the summer, not only in this state but also in
Indiana, Ohio, and western Pennsylvania, which engaged alto-
gether about 150,000 men. Prices remained steady. Each
successive year now saw a new record of production estab-
lished, the output being as follows in long tons :
"Statistical Report of the Illinois Board of Agriculture, August i, 1915,
p. 4-5, December i, 1915, p. 5.
THE PANIC OF 1893
PRODUCTION OF PIG IRON IN ILLINOIS
405
Year
Number tons
Price at Chicago
Local Charcoal
No. 2 ** pig iron *
1893 405,261 $l2.8o $16.15
1894 604,795 10.56 14.68
1895 1,006,091 II.So . 13-85
1896 925,239 11.64 13-62
1897 1,117,239 10.68 13.00
1898 1,365,898 11.32 11.58
1899 1,442,012 18.40 19.81
1900 1,363,383 1947 21-94
1901 1,596,850 I5-38 17-50
1902 1,730,220 20.86 23-50
1903 1,692,375 '19-25 22.13
1904 1,655,991 H-37 J 5-50
1905 2,034,483 17.65 18.00
1906 2,158,866 20.43 20.71
1907 2,457,768 24.50 26.56
1908 1,691,944 17.57 20.24
1909 2,467,156 17.49 19.50
1910 2,675,646 *7-O9 18.66
1911 2,108,002 14-83 16.94
i9"2 2,887,359 15.32 16.74
1913 2,927,832 15.85 16.50
1914 1,847,451 13.60 15.60
1915 2,447,220 14.01 16.13
19*6 3,922,512 20.26 21.33
The year 1897 may be said to have witnessed the end of
the long period of business depression and the beginning of
an upward swing which continued for practically a decade, not
only in Illinois but in the country at large. The movement
thus begun was accelerated in the following year. For this
improvement the Commercial and Financial Chronicle held
the following causes responsible : " ( I ) Further victories for
sound money, (2) good crops, (3) unprecedented exports of
merchandise, and (4) a successful foreign war." 30 While
these were not all equally important in Illinois, the first two
28 Local number 2, at Chicago, per gross (long) ton, from Statistical Report
of the American Iron and Steel Institute, 1914, p. 91.
29 Prices of Lake Superior charcoal pig iron at Chicago. Ibid., 93. ,
30 Financial Review, 1899, p. i.
4 o6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
were of undoubted influence in promoting a spirit of confidence
and in providing a substantial basis for expansion. A series
of lean years in the production of corn came to an end in 1898,
and an even longer period of unprofitable crops ended in 1900
in the case of wheat and oats, the three principal grain crops in
Illinois. Since that time there has been no year in which the
farmers of Illinois as a group have not made a substantial
profit from the production of corn and oats, and only three
years (1903, 1905, and 1912) in which the wheat crops re-
sulted in failure and consequent loss. 31
Another index of increasing prosperity and financial growth
is furnished by statistics of bank clearings. 32 Statistics of crops
and of iron production supply evidence of the strength of the
fundamental basis of industrial expansion, but bank clearings
are perhaps a better test of trade activity. Chicago passed
Philadelphia in 1890 in the volume of bank clearings, and
Boston in 1892, and since that time has ranked second to New
York except in the years 1895, 1896, 1897, an d l %99- The
following table shows their amount:
CHICAGO BANK CLEARINGS (000,000 OMITTED)
1893 4,677
1894 4,3iS
1895 4,615
1896 4,413
1897 4,576
1898... 5,517
1899 6,612
1900 6,800
1901 7,756
1902 8,395
1903 8,756
1904 8,990
1905 10,142
1906 11,047
1907 12,088
1908 ",854
1909 13,782
1910 13,940
19" 13,926
1912 15,381
1913 16,073
J9H 15,693
1915 16,199
1916 20,542
1917 24,975
81 Statistical Report of Illinois Board of Agriculture, August i, 1915, p. 4-5,
December i, 1915, p. 5.
32 In the account of banking which follows the author wishes to acknowledge
the valuable assistance derived from State Bank in Illinois since 1863, prepared
by Mr. William H. Dreesen as master's thesis at the University of Illinois in 1916.
THE PANIC OF 1893
407
The bank clearings in the eight next most important cities
in the state serve to emphasize the financial supremacy of Chi-
cago, for they total only about $647,000,000 as compared with
Chicago's $24,975,000,000 for 1917. Peoria showed a steady
growth until 1912, since which time there has been a serious
though fluctuating decline. A fairly steady development is
evidenced by the transactions in Springfield, Rockford, Quincy,
and Bloomington, but the three remaining cities, Danville, De-
catur, and Jacksonville, have remained practically stagnant.
The bank clearings in these cities for the last few years are
shown in the following table:
BANK CLEARINGS IN ILLINOIS CITIES OTHER THAN CHICAGO (ooo OMITTED)
Year
Peoria
Springfield
Rockford Bloomington
I OOO.. .
. I4C.848
46.OQ1
91. 824.
26,O24
156,462
51,020
30,004
10.0.61
I OI I. . .
161,238
<4.86i
4O.747
11.80?
TQI2 . .
. I71.O22
eg. 740
A1 6oi
15.780
58,607
CO. 1 07
17.578
IQI4.
. 171,022
50.288
4.8 6lO
1C. 078
. ICC O7 1
co 080
igi6
2O5 262
11 1O1
61 085
IOI7. . .
. 2C2 tlO
O7 OOJ.
85 187
Year
Quincy
Decatur
Danville
Jacksonville
1909
27,888
2i,553
14,429
1910
30,428
24,627
23,174
15,864
1911
34,082
22,900
21,728
15,488
1912
35,936
25,276
22,600
14,241
1913
42,016
27,148
24,621
17,205
1914
43,856
24,920
24,426
i5,79i
1915
40,476
22,324
25,579
14,206
1916
56,701
34,946
30,323
18,245
1917
59,120
43,592
30,328
21,859
The same forces which have given to Illinois and to Chi-
cago, as its leading city, their commanding role in the commer-
cial and industrial development of the central west, have also
4 o8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
centered here the financial and banking power of this section.
Chicago now ranks second only to New York City as a financial
center in the United States. National banks, attracted by the
opportunities for profit in a rapidly expanding commonwealth,
have steadily grown in numbers and magnitude. State banks
have shown an even more noteworthy development, which may
be attributed to excellent banking laws and adequate super-
vision. Only in the case of private banks has there been cause
for criticism, and this is even now being removed.
The history of banking in Illinois since 1893 contains little
of new legislation, but is rather one of achievement under ex-
isting law. Necessarily therefore the story is one of the
establishment of new institutions and the development of old
ones, as shown by statistics of growth in numbers, capital,
loans, deposits, and other indices of banking power. Were the
inner meaning of these figures revealed it would constitute a
record of the agricultural, commercial, and industrial devel-
opment of the state, for all these branches of activity have
drawn as it were their very life blood from the financial insti-
tutions. To the integrity, the far-visioned faith, and withal
the reasoned restraint of Illinois bankers is due much of the
economic advance of the past twenty-five years.
During the years of depression following the panic of 1893
the condition of the banks in Illinois was stagnant, though their
reputation for soundness was maintained, 33 but after about
1898 there was a steady and healthy expansion of banking. In
1893 there were in the state 212 national banks with a capital
of $38,195,000 and deposits of $104,833,000; the state banks
numbered 117 with combined capital and surplus of $23,296,-
33 In the eight years following the panic of 1893 only two national banks
in the state failed. These were the Second National Bank of Rockford and the
National Bank of Illinois of Chicago, both of which failed in 1896. The state
of Illinois has an excellent record in this regard, as only four national banks
have failed in Chicago in the thirty-seven years from July i, 1880 to June 30,
1917. During the same period in the whole state only fourteen national
banks failed, with a combined capital of $4,113,500. The loss to depositors
amounted to thirty-two hundredths of one per cent, which was the lowest of any
state in the union. Report of the Comptroller of the Currency, 1914, 2:114;
X 9*7i P- 70, 76.
THE PANIC OF 1893 409
213 and deposits of $91,410,394; while the private banks were
reported as 123, with capital of $3,769,308 and deposits of
$10,481,511. These last figures were probably too low, but
if they are accepted at their face value there was a combined
banking capital of $65,260,000 in some 450 banks, with total
deposits of $216,725,000. By 1914 the corresponding figures
were as follows:
KIND OF BANK
Number
Capital
Deposits
National
. 4.71
$76.100,000
State
. 786
88,422,000
s^s. 877.000
Private
22A
A. 221 OOO
28 271 OOG
Total 1,481 $168,835,000 $1,149,187,000
One movement that made for better banking throughout
this whole period was the organization of the Illinois State
Bankers' Association, formed in 1890. There was consoli-
dated with it in 1894 the Private Bankers' Association, which
had been organized as a separate body in i89i. 34 The
bankers' association now consists of national, state, and private
bankers. It has from the beginning of its existence been a
strong factor in improving banking practice, in maintaining
high ideals, and in urging legislation to promote these stand-
ards. It has generally taken an unequivocal stand on the
monetary and financial problems which confronted the Amer-
ican people and always on the side of sound money and good
banking. On the subjects of free silver and the gold standard,
which agitated banking and financial circles during the last
decade of the nineteenth century, they passed strong resolu-
tions. At their annual convention on June 14, 1894, they de-
clared themselves opposed to free silver. Two years later
they announced themselves unalterably in favor of maintaining
the gold standard, a declaration which they repeated in
34 " Banking and Financial Items," Bankers' Magazine, 49:66.
35 / bid., 51:69; 53:559-
4 io THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
The tendency toward consolidation was evidenced in the
banking world about 1900, just as it was in commerce and
industry. Here it was restrained by positive law, however,
which prevented the elimination of the small bank with limited
capital, even in the largest cities. The prohibition of branch
banking in the United States has prevented the development of
great central institutions, but a consolidation of smaller banks
in the cities into single large and strong institutions has fre-
quently taken place. The growth of small banks in towns and
villages was directly encouraged by the federal act of March
14, 1900, which permitted the organization of national banks
with a capital of $25,000 in places with a population not ex-
ceeding 3,000. Between the date of the passage of this act
and October 31, 1902, there were organized in Illinois 66 na-
tional banks, of which 49 had a capital of less than $50,000,
showing a rapid increase of the smaller banks. Four of these
were state banks which reorganized as national banks. During
the fourteen years ending in 1914 some twenty-four state banks
changed to national associations or were consolidated with
them. 36
Another effect of the act of March 14, 1900, was to in-
crease greatly the amount of bank notes issued by the national
banks. The circulation in Illinois doubled in one year, increas-
ing from $7,000,000 in 1899 to over $13,000,000 in igoo. 37
This was needed by the expanding industry and commerce
of the state. Much more important for this purpose, how-
ever, has been the expansion of bank deposits which furnish
a credit currency more in demand in American commercial
and banking practice. The expansion of banking interests
in Illinois is clearly indicated in the following table, in which
the mere growth in number and capital is far exceeded
by the other items. Not only has the average bank grown
in magnitude, but it has to an even greater extent expanded
86 Auditor's Report, 1900-1914, circa p. xi or xii.
37 Bankers' Magazine, 64:653. In the United States as a whole the rate of
increase was even greater, being over $100,000,000 in the two years following
this act.
THE PANIC OF 1893
411
its operations and thus proved of value to the community it
served.
NATIONAL BANKS IN THE STATE OF ILLINOIS (ooo OMITTED)
YEAR
Number
national
banks
Loans
Deposits
Circulation
Capital
Surplus
Profits
1889
188
$II2.8l4
$03.6oo
$4.66?
$3O.800
$10.765
$4 680
1890
102
1 22. 7 5O
102,696
4,821
31,222
12.105
5.2O3
1891
2O2
138.084
116,861
c,I7O
36.076
I4.04O
5,368
1892
1803 . .
211
212
159,821
Il6,522
131,589
IO4833
5,350
5,844
39,946
38,105
16,167
17.026
6,326
l.dd/I
180.1. .
217
137.637
118.328
5.014
28,401
17.751
4 643
1805 .
22O
144.308
114,074
6,258
38.671
l6,054
S.I3O
1896 ....
221
127.366
103,^44
6,640
30. 221
16,118
5 O73
1807 .
221
133. 607
Il8.727
6,101
37,476
14.025
4 826
1898
2l8
I<6,7OQ
140.042
6,782
36,046
16,004
5,007
1800. .
217
187,234
168,306
7,036
35,711
16,007
5,o6o
1900
24O
2O9,IO8
181,866
13,728
37,733
I 5,025
7 303
IQOI
255
2eO.384
217.020
17,420
30.1 S4
I 5,83O
0.344
x 902
2?6
282,OO7
238.450
14,31 5
44.Q3O
10,423
0.220
TOO! .
3O4
282,912
241, 755
17,567
47,390
21,523
10,962
TOOd . .
324.
3OO.I 5O
258,032
IO.O47
48,811
22,280
IO. 572
I OO 5 . .
34.6
320.642
276,382
21,658
48,709
22.4O5
11,446
1 006
373
336.1 17
280,773
27,064
40,841
25.IOO
IO.332
1907
1908
1909
1910
1911
1912
1913
1914
1915
1916. . . .
395
410
419
432
437
448
459
465
470
47i
368,472
366,756
403,082
445,063
475,748
498,385
513,648
506,711
542,056
649,850
301,530
310,226
353,494
374,o82
297,098
427,865
415,022
436,670
474,793
585,039
29,034
31,602
36,737
41,634
39,435
39,89i
42,270
63,270
40,217
28,364
54,571
56,233
58,728
71,880
74,785
75,440
75,777
75,830
76,105
76,190
29,345
31,075
31,630
37,908
42,171
43,572
44,848
45,624
45,747
46,073
12,873
14,523
13,255
12,692
11,095
I2,32O
15,406
18,951
18,612
i9,36i
Few events have caused serious disturbance in banking
circles during the period since 1900. The effects of the panic
of 1907 were felt for some time, but Illinois banks suffered no
serious reverses. There were no receiverships during 1907
and not a single national or state bank closed its doors. 38 Dur-
38 Auditor's Report, 1908, p. xii.
4 i2 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ing the ten years from 1905 to 1914 some sixteen state banks
went into the hands of receivers, but the biennial reports of
the auditor give no information as to the settlement of the
affairs of the banks. 39 It may be concluded, however, that the
failures of the state banks have probably not involved their
depositors in any greater loss than in the case of failed national
banks.
That the state banks have given satisfaction to the people
is shown by the fact that these have passed the national banks
in the state in number, in loans and discounts, and in capital
stock. Not only has the increase in the total number of state
banks been more rapid than that of national banks, but even in
the case of those state institutions with a capital large enough
to permit their incorporation as national banks the growth
has been more rapid. If for instance the number of state and
national banks with a capital of $50,000 and over be com-
pared, it appears that in 1888 the former were about one-sixth
as numerous as the latter (29 to 182), in 1899 about one-
third (69 to 217), and in 1909 about two-thirds (187 to
294). 40 There are obviously certain reasons operative in Illi-
nois which make the incorporation of banks under the state
laws more profitable or desirable than under the national bank-
ing system.
The national banks enjoy certain advantages in the monop-
oly of note issue, which has been highly profitable since 1900,
and in the wider credit they enjoy, which makes them more
desirable in communities with far-reaching commercial and
financial connections. On the other hand the state banks pos-
sess the power to loan on real estate, which is particularly
valuable in developing agricultural communities. Accordingly,
a larger concentration of the national banks is found in the
cities, where there is not so much desire to effect real estate
^ 89 Usually the report contents itself with the statement " no report made,"
which refers to the biennial period covered. When the receiver's report is
finally received it is not given by the auditor. See auditor's report for any year
circa p. xi-xiv.
40 Barnett, State Banks and Trust Companies since the Passage of the
National-Bank Act, 221.
THE PANIC OF 1893 413
loans but where the wider credit of the institutions would be of
value, while the state banks are widely scattered throughout
the small towns and rural communities. 41 A considerable part
of their business is with farmers and owners of agricultural
land. Another advantage which state banks in Illinois possess
over national banks is the lower reserve requirement, which is
particularly important in the development of the savings bank
business. 42
There has been little banking legislation enacted in Illinois
since the passage of the bank act of 1887, but a few amend-
ments have from time to time been made to that measure, de-
signed to strengthen some of its provisions. 43 The passage of
the federal reserve act has brought about some changes in the
national banks, but affected the state banks only slightly for
two or three years. After the declaration of war against Ger-
many in 1917, however, a large number of state banks entered
the federal reserve system in order that they might be of
greater service to the federal government in its enormous credit
and loan operations.
The following table, giving the essential facts in the de-
velopment of the state banks, shows a steady and healthy but
never an abnormal expansion. No sign is here to be found of
unhealthy speculation or wildcat banking, but rather the
growth of an institution which was proving itself of real serv-
ice to the community.
41 The majority of the small banks are state institutions, while the majority
of the large banks are national. Thus in 1909 the situation was as follows
(ibid., 231):
NUMBER OF STATE AND NATIONAL BANKS IN ILLINOIS, 1909
Capital National State
$ 25,000 and less than $ 50,000 125 232
50,000 " " " 100,000 158 no
100,000 and over 136 77
42 See below, p. 419-420.
43 Laws of 1897, p. 88 ; Laws of 1907, p. 53.
STATEMENT OF ILLINOIS STATE BANKS 4 * (ooo OMITTED)
YEAR
Number
state
banks
Loans
and
discounts
Deposits
other
than
savings
Capital
Surplus
Undivided
profits
180*. .
125
$ 62,118
$ SS.^2?
$l8.4Q7
$ 5 406
$ 3,821
180.1. .
128
76.308
6l.6O4
18,082
3.043
1801
136
00,44.7
6C.2I3
18.814
7nfi
3.124
1896
138
76.711
58,160
18.010
3.720
1807
142
82,866
76.i?8
l8.07O
8 OTO
3.612
1898
I4O
86,389
66,1^6
16,67^
7.O7Q
4.O32
1800. .
151
117.674.
71,467
17.722
7.4.63
4,83O
I OOO
ICC
127.116
81,44.8
18,357
7.164
6,008
I gO I
160
I1O.821
88.1I4
20.0^0
o 760
C.-53C
I gO2
20 5
188 311
Q8,OQ2
4i. ^6<
13.321
5,367
TQO3 .
252
21 1,721
1^8,^ S2
36,60?
1 1 QOI
7,7O3
IOO .
28?
228,521
138.832
78,0^0
16 788
8.844
IOO1 .
321
3O7.OQI
162,025
4O. I QO
1 8 274
IO,236
1 906
4 4
720 32Q
163,222
42,080
19 620
XI. I C2
I OO7 . .
OQ2
<1 ci 862
230.362
CO.77O
22 4.IO
1 3.O2Q
1908
4J2C.
316 OO4
236,258
c^,2Q^
213 1O
I2.Q7O
I OOO . .
4.61
264-178
275,468
ec,7o8
26.633
1 1 ,4C I
I glo
CO 5
J.O2 187
281.010
S0.668
31.368
l8,754
IQI I . .
c6i
/ICQ A87
333.784
67,523
34.I4O
15.177
IQI2. .
618
CI2 6^4.
34.0.060
76.870
36,808
16,566
IQI3 . .
684
C J.O O CI
317 Q43
82.760
43.O18
1 6, 740
IOI-1. .
712
c-}$ 2ie
367.147
87.171
4,6.1 cq
l8,754.
IQI 1 . .
760
577 86
44.6.3OI
88,513
11.407
l6,475
1016. .
786
618.726
131.877
88.422
12.012
10.616
Provision had been made by law in 1887 for the establish-
ment of trust companies, but for a decade their growth was
very slow. By 1898 only eleven companies had qualified under
the act to execute trusts. Ten of these were located in Chicago
and one in Quincy. The annual examinations showed the com-
panies to be in a satisfactory condition. 45 When the trust com-
panies began to develop their discount and deposit business and
to invade the field of* banking immediate protest was made by
the bankers, especially by those in the larger cities; and restric-
44 Compiled from biennial reports of the auditor of public accounts.
45 Auditor's Report, 1898, p. xii.
THE PANIC OF 1893 415
tive legislation was urged, some even going so far as to suggest
that the trust companies be taxed out of existence. Bankers-
contended that the trust companies were not authorized nor
qualified to engage in the banking business. One cause of com-
plaint against the trust companies was that they were not
required by law to keep on hand the twenty-five per cent
demanded of the reserve city banks, and that many of them
maintained a cash reserve much smaller than this, but put
large sums on deposit with the national banks, where it earned
carrying charges and still remained a security at once
available. 46 The national banks in particular felt this as a
grievance.
Trust companies have a decided advantage over banks or-
ganized under either state or national law in being able to
combine with their banking business a trust business. Such an
institution may exercise a wide range of powers, such as receiv-
ing valuables for safe-keeping, caring for property intrusted
to them, managing estates, making investments, giving financial
and legal advice, assisting in the preparation of wills and exe-
cuting them after the decease of the customer. 47 In the larger
cities, as Chicago, there has been a rapid growth of these insti-
tutions, and their development in the smaller cities as well may
be expected.
The trust companies have shown a very rapid growth in
number, but much more significant is the extraordinary expan-
sion in business which these institutions have attracted. Some
notion of their development may be gained from the figures
published by the comptroller of the currency, though these rep-
resent returns from only about two-thirds of the loan and trust
companies in the state. These are given for the last few years
in the table on the following page. 48
Private banks have flourished most in the middle west
and in no state more than in Illinois. Here there has been
a steady growth in numbers, but a decline in the average cap-
46 Chicago Banker, 3:129; 6:3.
47 Herrick, Trust Companies, 32.
48 Compiled from the annual reports of the comptroller of the currency.
4i6 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
ital. 49 It would seem, therefore, that the private banks have
filled a place from which the national banks were barred by
reason of the larger capital necessitated by law, and one which
even the state banks have not filled. In the thirty-two-year
LOAN AND TRUST COMPANIES IN ILLINOIS (ooo OMITTED)
YEAR
Number
reporting
Loans
and
discounts
Aggregate
resources
Deposits
Capital
IQIO
A-t
$2e? 166
$47i.6cc
$164.780
$1<.7OO
IOI I . .
A\
262 164
oo. <84
382,008
12.OOO
TQT2. .
4.6
318,201
e 78.4.04.
41C.42O
10, 22?
TQT7 . .
C1
112 20O
?7Q.2O6
4.18,21'?
40, 6 SO
IOIJ. .
r6
111 1Q7
601 013
4?6. 6<i
41,42 e
iqi e. .
e
116, 7i<
610,647
457,622
41,875
1016. .
S 6
A. I < .06 C
716.217
<6l,4Q7
42,412
period from 1877 to 1909 the number of private banks in Illi-
nois trebled, increasing from 282 in the first year to 441 in
1888, to 599 in 1899, and to 823 in I9O9. 50 These institutions
fall into two distinct classes, according to the functions they
fulfill. In the large cities they are organized by brokers as
adjuncts to their business, and in the small agricultural com-
munities they furnish the needed credit facilities which national
and state banks provide in larger places. The chief character-
istic of private banks of both classes is their small capital, and
they would undoubtedly prefer to operate without incorpora-
tion as long as the amount of capital which can find profitable
employment in a given community is smaller than the minimum
required for a state or national bank. In the following table
are given the statistics furnished by the auditor concerning pri-
vate banks:
49 According to returns made to the internal revenue officials in 1882 the
average capital of private banks in the middle western states was under $20,000.
According to returns made to the national monetary commission in 1909, it was
$11,000 in the same section. Most of them had between $10,000 and $15,000.
50 Barnett, State Banks and Trust Companies since the Passage of the
National-Bank Act, 208.
THE PANIC OF 1893
ILLINOIS PRIVATE BANKS (ooo OMITTED)
417
Loans
Capital
and
stock
YEAR
Number
discounts
Deposits
paid in
1892
149
$15,225
$14,857
$4,600
I93
"3
10,924
10,482
3,769
1894
112
10,194
10,692
3,792
1895
154
I4,OIO
14,802
S.034
1896
109
8,715
7,902
3> 94
1897
108
7,603
7,IS8
3,049
1898
"9
9,386
io,44S
2,781
1899
IOO
6,806
8,926
1,845
1 900
135
9,830
12,944
2,392
1901
iS7
12,177
16,298
2,703
1902
178
18,453
23,174
3,408
1903
168
l8,000
23,069
2,851
1904
132
12,298
14,887
2,189
1905
180
22,2i6
25,596
3,864
1906
I2S
13,312
15,686
2,419
1907
157
20,045
24,38i
3448
1908
157
20,723
24,863
3,440
I9<>9
420
46,490
28,127
7,325
1910
200
22,8lO
26,223
3,809
1911
246
27,993
24,803
5,134
1912
259
30,847
26,516
5,861
1913
235
3i,7H
26,653
4,493
I9H
224
28,008
28,271
4,223
The table concerning private banks in Illinois, though of
interest, is unquestionably far from exact. It would indicate,
for instance, that during the past five years there were on the
average only two private banks in each county, whereas it is a
matter of common knowledge that there are more. In 1892,
according to the comptroller's report, there were only 149
private banks in the state, but when the Private Bankers' Asso-
ciation of Illinois was formed that same year they reported that
there were 500 private bankers in the state. 51 For the year
1909 the comptroller took his figures from the report of the
national monetary commission, according to which there
were 420 private banks with loans and discounts amounting
to $46,489,546. Both the number of banks and their re-
61 Bankers' Magazine, 46 : 659.
4 i8 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
sources as thus reported were more than double the same items
as reported by the auditor for the years preceding and follow-
ing. Undoubtedly the figures for 1909 are the more nearly
exact. And finally a very careful count of all the private banks
in the state, by townships, was made in 1915 by the legislative
reference bureau, which enumerated 586, or more than double
the number reported by the auditor. Of these forty-seven were
located in Chicago.
Efforts have been made from time to time to secure the pas-
sage of a law requiring reports from and examinations of these
private banks, but until 1917 without success. 52 The demand
was strongest in the cities and especially in Chicago where the
evils of unregulated banking were most keenly felt, but was
successfully resisted by the interests in the rural districts and
particularly in the southern section of the state. Here the pri-
vate banks had been honestly and efficiently managed and had
met the banking needs of communities which probably could
not afford to support banks with the minimum capital required
by state and national law.
The movement to bring the private banks under the same
sort of regulation and supervision that have served to give
security and standing to the national and state banks grew
stronger with the passage of time. It finally culminated in
1917 after both parties had pledged themselves to some sort
of reform of existing abuses, and Governor Lowden demanded
such legislation in his inaugural address and again in a fiery
message in the midst of the ensuing legislative session. 53 The
measure passed the senate by a vote of 37 to 6, and the house
99 to 42, receiving the governor's approval on June 22, 1917.
In accordance with the constitution this act will be submitted
for popular referendum in November, 1918.
There are no special laws governing savings banks in the
state of Illinois, and banks organized under the general laws
may carry on a combined commercial and savings business or
52 Bankers' Magazine, 45 : 706.
53 Chicago Tribune, January 9, May 10, 1917.
THE PANIC OF 1893 419
may be conducted as savings banks only. Private banks and
loan and trust companies, as well as national and state asso-
ciations, may receive savings deposits. In 1893 the savings
deposits in forty-four state banks totaled a little over $19,000,-
ooo, and in 1899 had reached only $55,000,000 in forty-six
banks. Since 1900, however, the growth in savings deposits
has been very rapid, due largely to the increasing prosperity
of the people. In 1912 over half of the state banks 371
out of 618 held savings deposits, which aggregated $278,-
047,586. The auditor reported two years later that thirty-five
out of every one hundred inhabitants of the state had a savings
account, whose average amount was $28i.5o. 54
Loan and trust companies rank next to state banks in favor
as depositories for the savings of the citizens of Illinois, hav-
ing almost doubled such deposits in the past five years. As
reported to the comptroller of the currency they increased
from $121,000,000 in 1911 to $233,000,000 in 1914, but fell
off slightly the following year.
A considerable number of national banks 196 in 1911
also maintained savings departments, for which accurate
data are available in the comptroller's reports. Unofficial and
incomplete statistics of savings deposits in private banks are
also published in the same reports. And to these there should
be added, since their establishment in 1910, the deposits in the
postal savings banks. The available data on these various
institutions for the last few years are presented in the follow-
ing table: 55
Si Auditor's Report, 1914, p. xv.
55 Compiled from the annual reports of the comptroller of the currency.
Faulty as the statistics presented undoubtedly are, they yet show an impressive
volume of savings, which amounted in the year 1915 to over $500,000,000 or
about $94 per inhabitant. But they would certainly be much larger if pro-
vision were made by law for the organization of mutual savings banks, such
as exist in other states. Over half of the savings deposits in the United States
as a whole are made in mutual savings banks. Out of a total of $6,972,069,227
on June 4, 1913, the following amounts were deposited in the institutions specified
(000,000 omitted): state banks, $636.9; mutual savings banks, $3,768.9; stock
savings banks, $744.5; loan and trust companies, $970.9; private banks, $26.4;
national banks, $824.5. Report of the Secretary of the Treasury of the United
States, 1913, p. 455.
420 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
SAVINGS DEPOSITS IN ILLINOIS INSTITUTIONS
YEAR
Loan and
trust
companies
National
banks
State
banks
Private
banks
Postal
savings
banks
1910... .
*
$32,325,077
$229,127,316
*
*
1911
$120,955,194.
33,887,112
256,206,543
$8,579,805
*
1912... .
212,564,356
45,653,424
278,047,585
8,954,191
*
1913....
216,644,432
*
*
9,139,066
$2,862,889
1914....
232,509,37!
44,05 3,228f
289,765,206
4,968,991
3,596,470
1915....
218,314,439
46,794,8 iof
295,279,038
5,215,718
4,952,414
1916.. . .
232,882,021
io3,854,ooot
326,156,217
5,878,106
5,991,844
* Not reported. t Time certificates of deposit, payable after thirty days.
The statistics of savings bank deposits in Illinois do not by
themselves afford an adequate picture of the annual savings
of the mass of the people, for other institutions, like building
and loan associations, have served as agencies for the accumu-
lation of small sums. These associations have always been
popular in this state, though for a decade after 1895 they suf-
fered somewhat of a decline from the high water mark of that
year. Illinois ranks fifth among the states of the union in the
total assets of these associations. Their growth is indicated
in the following table :
BUILDING AND LOAN ASSOCIATIONS
YEAR ENDING
Number
Total receipts
Total assets
December
u
M
I, i8ov. .
. 726
$46,306,970
33,290,363
29,603,620
42,948,481
63,961,568
70,704,218
$ 82,639,259
47,896,148
42,897,267
63,200,355
98,390,668
105,478,403
1 900
. S72
I OCX. . .
. ?O<
IQIO. . .
. ?AO
IOIS.. .
. 6??
IQl6
6j_Q
In this brief review there is recorded a growth not merely
in the financial institutions which have been described, but in
the wealth and resources of the people of Illinois. It is an im-
pressive showing, and becomes the more so when one reflects
that this financial strength is the result of only a century's
growth. Toil, and self-denial, and wise investment lie at the
basis of this development, as indeed they do of the economic
progress of the state in all lines.
XIX. STATE FINANCES
IT WAS the famous French minister Turgot who originated
the epigram pauvre peuple, pauvre royaume, which today
may be translated "if the people are poor the state will be
poor." The state finances of Illinois accordingly reflect in a
measure the economic condition of the people, swelling to large
proportions in times of prosperity and shrinking again under
the chill winds of adversity. This is more true of taxes, which
come directly out of the pockets of the taxpayers, than of
expenditures, which are often light-heartedly voted in the face
of an impending deficit. It is proverbially easy to spend other
people's money.
But the parallelism is not close. The household of the
state is on a stable basis and taxes are collected in bad years as
in good. There are to be found in the state finances, there-
fore, fewer of the ups and downs which are characteristic of
the income and expenditures of the average business man. On
the other hand there has been a pretty steady and recently a
startlingly rapid growth of both sides of the budget. The
state of Illinois enjoys a patrimony the wealth and produc-
tive power of its people which expands progressively and
yearly permits the development of new activities and the ex-
pansion of the old. The figures in which these services are ex-
pressed are indicative of the economic development of the state
along all lines of private as well as public activity.
The finances of the state were adversely affected by the
panic of 1893 a "d the resulting depression, and for several
years showed the effect of smaller valuations on the assess-
ment lists. From the high water mark of $5,854,269 receipts
from the general property tax in 18911892, the revenue from
this source fell off sharply by $1,000,000 the following bien-
421
422 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
nium. And as the disbursements increased by another $1,000,-
ooo, to which was added a small deficit from the preceding
year, the biennium 1893-1894 ended with a deficit of almost
$2,500,000. A considerable increase in revenues during the
next two years served to reduce this figure to about $1,000,000;
and further improvement during the biennial period 1897
1898, with good crops and reviving business, transformed this
deficit into a favorable balance of about the same amount.
Only once since that time has the close of a biennial period
recorded a deficit in the state treasury, and that was after the
panic of 1907. But this was due to greatly enlarged appropria-
tions rather than to declining revenues. A general summary
of state finances since 1893 is given in the following table:
TOTAL RECEIPTS AND DISBURSEMENTS, 1893-1916
YEARS
Total
receipts
Total
disbursements
Total
surplus
1801-04.. .
. $ Q.4.17.088
$11 864. O77
$2 426 080*
180^-06.
ii.5i8.SQi
12.657,751
I.HO.i6o*
1807-08. .
14.204.684
I1.OI7.6S2
I.277.O1I
iSoQ'OO. .
14.482,548
I4.O27 587
454 060
I9OI-O2
16 382,020
15,621,652
760.168
I9O1-O4.
1 6 401.486
l6 422 C76
68.0OO
ioos-06. .
IQ 761.176
17 661 183
2 IOI.OQ2
1007-08. .
19 588 842
21 278 805
I 689 963*
IOOO-IO. .
21613 150
21 Q4.C 8oi
c67 147
1911-12
26 occ 101
2<C 88l 487
I O71 7O4
IQI1-I4. .
to 708 784.
12 952 862
6 7CC Q22
ioi?-i6. .
11 n/i/i 9 A T
45 708 882
6 Q2C O55
* Signifies a deficit.
Between 1893 an ^ 1906 the growth in expenditures by the
state was steady, but no greater than was necessitated by the
increase of population and the extension of governmental
functions. Beginning with 1907, however, there is a very
sharp increase in expenditures, which have advanced since that
time at a progressive rate, so that while it took fifteen years
between 1891 and 1906 to double the state expenditures, a
single decade, from 1907 to 1916, has again seen a doubling.
This is a rate of increase five times as rapid as the growth of
C/3 : ::::
CO I-!!: !
STATE FINANCES 423
the population and almost twice as great as the increase in the
estimated wealth of the people. 1 Such an expansion as this
calls for a somewhat close scrutiny of the expenditures in order
to ascertain what has caused this growth.
Before attempting to analyze any particular expansion in
Illinois state expenditures it must be pointed out that the last
twenty years have been a period of rising prices and that the
money values in which services and commodities are expressed
have increased steadily, and in the last few years with ex-
traordinary rapidity. There has therefore been a statistical
increase in the monetary figures which express the activities of
the state without a correspondingly great increase in these ac-
tivities. This has been particularly marked in the last two
years, since the deluge of gold which has flooded this country
as a result of the European war and has caused a general rise
in the price level.
After making all possible allowance for this factor, how-
ever, it still remains true that there has been a great expansion
in the activities and expenditures of the state government. In
the following table the expenditures of the state have been
grouped in such a way as to present clearly the main lines of
state activity and to show distinctly for what purposes the state
revenues have been spent. 2
The salaries and other expenses of administrative officers
show a steady, and since 1904 a very swift, increase. This is
due in part to the gradual increase in the salaries of state offi-
cers, but more especially to the great multiplication of assistants
and clerks, necessitated by the rapid increase in the volume of
business transacted by the various departments. New offices
have also from time to time been created.
The cost of legislative sessions has increased less than
most other items in the table. The unusually large expendi-
1 Estimated Valuation of National Wealth, 1850-1912, p. 20.
2 It may be said in passing that this is not the way they are presented in
the auditor's reports, but the way they should be grouped. For a statement of
the items included under each of the headings in the table see p. 427-429, and
p. 511-515-
4 2 4 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Administrative
General
udicia
offices
assembly
BlENNIUM
Salaries
Other
expenses
Pay and
mileage
Other
expenses
Salaries
Other
expenses
I
la
II
Ha
III
Ilia
1893-94.
$103,446
85,281
$246,091
$ 28,706
$580,237
$ 77,530
1895-96...
128,965
93,6i9
318,129
57,128
613,193
75,592
1897-98...
129,363
90,874
422,995
68,387
647,086
95,3"
1899-00. ..
I53.J33
114,403
291,438
27,173
757,055
102,622
I9OI-O2. . .
179,893
149,927
300,360
29,938
774, 6 95
109,374
1903-04. . .|
I74.Q5 1
170,587
300,962
32,066
770,554
121,362
I905-06...I
211,306
339,831
334,884
36,412
787,257
173,564
I9O7-O8. . .
238,189
452,879
352,335
60,472
826,509
505,492
I909-IO. ..
298,701
642,111
606,074
61,084
981,765
181,772
I9II-I2. . .
341,232
781,203
605,732
106,080
1,098,524
178,120
1913-14...
417,627
1,095,899
528,127
170,808
1,209,701
215,971
I9I5-I6. . .
758,603
1,681,263
734,984
295,121
1,753,822
352,484
BlENNIUM
Militia
and
military
affairs
State
house and
executive
mansion
Public
schools
Public
health
Internal
improve-
ments
and public
works
Agricul-
ture
VIII
IX
X
XI
XII
XIII
1893-94.
$ 236,336
$ 60,400
$2,138,565
$ 24,944
$ 15,020
$ 36,557
1895-96. ..
735,H7
73,432
2,135,245
18,338
12,345
158,752
1897-98...
417,466
124,922
2,129,451
24,226
59,570
266,471
J899-OO. ..
993,132
133,990
2,135,159
30,210
28,330
143,643
I9OI-O2. . .
684,537
139,074
2,079,843
54,43*
301,359
188,548
I9O3-O4. . .
734,5"
156,587
2,028,130
64,798
69,178
213,092
I9O5-O6. . .
635,270
78,882
2,081,255
79,106
101,972
130,024
1907-08. . .
1,008,998
160,273
2,138,217
"3,234
253,"7
130,593
I9O9-IO. . .
894,226
77,238
2,163,496
136,291
294,032
174,303
I9II-I2. . .
901,618
93,231
3,204,127
195,449
380,195
239,599
I9I3-I4-
1,123,817
117,838
5,262,154
216,213
7 I 6,735
507,182
Z9I5-I6. . .
i|875,875
79,067
6,946,768
596,033
1,870,036
937,300
STATE FINANCES
425
Educational
Charitable
Penal and correc-
Printing,
institutions
institutions
tional institutions
binding,
and sta-
tionery
Current
Other
Current
Other
Current
Other
expenses
expenses
expenses
expenses
expenses
expenses
IV
V
Va
VI
Via
VII
Vila
$108,271
$ 214,772
$ 274,000
$2,361,856
$ 417,048
$ 779,409
$592,294
128,154
273,381
490,274
2,456,551
587,989
666,853
390,547
117,987
363,483
543,396
2,581,266
550,282
1,018,875
331,889
"3,974
656,468
315,168
2,911,266
1,083,696
983,560
190,275
149,027
997,182
648,711
3,158,448
1,099,909
1,276,799
270,849
153,901
1,364,916
399,440
3,490,678
1,035,693
1,181,126
580,572
205,758
1,665,862
544,435
3,923,655
674,764
1,729,121
525,726
223,237
2,324,926
897,100
4,375,552
1,128,653
1,949,273
485,495
296,544
2,447,700
856,867
4,610,264
1,062,161
1,976,082
227,213
338,588
3,276,899
1,051,647
5,439,9
1,014,504
2,022,472
686,163
363,7 4
4,878,433
702,454
6,776,837
1,946,261
2,054,430
468,232
485,632
5,704> 77
2,016,930
7,553,234
2,868,104
2,619,126
834,255
ill
"n a
h
*o
X
a
o
B
o
id game
jrvation
cal nionu-
s, celebra-
a n d ex-
1
,0
'D
S
aneous
1
3!2
*o >'
H
'"
H
*-" *
rt g
"S
R
S Sjl
g
'B S
S-
o
*&
J
i
o2
H
XIV
XV
XVI
XVII
XVIII
XIX
XX
XXI
$ 168,158
$ 1,940
$2,744,994
$ 17,923
$459,279
$ 6,000
$ 81,165
$11,859,449
254,829
112
2,741,087
21,959
60,677
8,000
69,151
12,569,753
275,024
1,645
2,282,329
19,280
89,332
12,000
347,268
13,010,229
361,608
376
2,352,077
36,039
103,400
13,000
104,394
14,070,334
416,095
6
2,235,421
44,525
148,281
16,500
150,622
15,604,455
477,354
1,996
2,242,292
139,264
227,738
19,000
241,237
16,391,083
489,283
335
2,146,001
334,570
324,974
18,000
118,970
17,696,191
605,625
1,823
2,513,981
38i,7"
72,299
20,500
91,167
21,290,738
780,017
163
1,917,346
371,619
35,716
22,905
93,072
21,112,761
1,460,168
17,997
1,743,381
413,228
177,213
25,050
136,015
25,924,576
1,974,489
56
1,779,248
344,409
160,249
30,144
161,786
33,351,398
2,788,396
446
1,7^9,774
264,688
223,395
34,929
270,120
45, "3, 474
3 Warrants drawn by the auditor on the treasurer.
426 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
tures for certain biennial periods, as 1897-1898, 1909-1910,
1911-1912, were occasioned by the holding of extra sessions.
There has also been observable in ordinary years a tendency
toward longer sessions, due probably to the greater amount of
legislative business coming before the general assembly. Sal-
aries of employees have also shown a steady growth; and in the
period 19111914 a number of legislative committees were
appointed to investigate various phases of state activity, the
expenses of which are included in column lia and which have
helped to swell this column.
The expenditures for the judiciary show a steady but nor-
mal increase, due to the gradual expansion of the business of
the courts, to the inclusion of the salaries of an increasing
number of clerks, stenographers, and reporters, and also to
the organization of certain special courts in some of the larger
cities of the state. During the years 19051908, moreover,
about $350,000 was spent for a new site and building for the
supreme court.
The cost of public printing shows the same upward ten-
dency, which is especially marked after 1904, and is to be at-
tributed to the increased size of the ordinary public reports, and
to the increase in their number owing to the multiplication of
special commissions which make annual or biennial reports.
For the biennium 1915-1916 the increased cost of paper is of
course an important factor.
Expenditures for education have increased over twentyfold
between 1893 and 1916, a rate of increase exceeded only by
that for public works, but greatly surpassing this latter in abso-
lute amount. Up to 1898 the expansion of educational expen-
ditures, while marked, had been rather gradual, but beginning
with the following year they expanded rapidly. New normal
schools were being developed and after 1900 the state uni-
versity exhibited an amazing growth, causing the expenditures
in this column to increase by leaps and bounds. Appropria-
tions for new grounds and buildings appear in the table on
page 425, column Va.
STATE FINANCES 427
Expenditures for charitable institutions have grown very
rapidly until today they represent the largest group of expen-
ditures made for any object. Their growth has been par-
ticularly rapid since 1900, the last decade and a half having
witnessed a veritable campaign of building, not only in enlarg-
ing existing institutions, but in erecting new ones. This has
been necessitated by the growing recognition on the part of the
people of the state of the value of these institutions and con-
sequently of a constantly greater use of the opportunities for
relief and cure afforded by them to the defective and dependent
members of society. Since 1909 the control of all the state
charitable and penal and correctional institutions has been
centralized in the hands of the state board of administration.
The same sympathetic attitude which was observable
toward the charitable institutions has characterized in growing
measure the attitude of the state government toward the de-
linquent and criminal classes. The expenditures for their care
have increased in about the same proportion as for the former
group, though the totals are happily not so large. In the appli-
cation of these sums, moreover, a new purpose has steadily de-
veloped, that of reform rather than of vengeance. It is an
expenditure that should grow less in the course of time, if the
reformatory measures are effective and the therapeutic and pre-
ventive institutions, such as schools, agencies for public health,
and the prevention of industrial abuses, diminish the number
of the criminal classes. Thus far, however, the expenditures
for the penal and correctional institutions of the state have in-
creased pretty steadily, due to the growth in the number of
such institutions and to the better care and more humane treat-
ment given the inmates. Some of the larger items which are
responsible for the increase from year to year are given below. 4
4 Current expenses (vn), 1893-1894: home for juvenile offenders, $32,000;
large increases in all previously existing institutions; 1895-1896, economy due to
financial depression; 1897-1898, increase necessary to wipe out deficiencies result-
ing from under appropriations of previous biennium; also due to enlarged system
of control under state board of pardons; 1905-1906, beginning of a policy of more
liberal appropriations for these institutions.
Other expenses (vna), 1893-1894, state reformatory for new buildings, re-
428 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
Expenditures for militia and military affairs are not large
in any of the state governments and show only a normal growth
in Illinois. The cost of the adjutant general's department in-
creased gradually with the increase in its duties, and expendi-
tures for the national guard showed a similar upward ten-
dency owing to the growing number of enlistments in this
body. The fluctuations which appear from one biennium to
another are due in great part to the mobilization of the na-
tional guard for strike duty, upon which occasions the control
and maintenance of the militia would be taken over by the
state government.
There is little need for comment on the expenditures for
the statehouse and the executive mansion. Some of the items
are noted below. 5
Expenditures for common schools show very little variation
from year to year until the year 1911 is reached, since which
date they have gone up by leaps and bounds. This enormous
increase, resulting in a doubling of expenditures for this pur-
pose within half a decade, is due to the new policy of construct-
ing and maintaining an adequate system of township high
schools over the state.
With the payment of the canal debt the expenditures for
internal improvements and public works rapidly decreased un-
til they reached the low water mark in 1 895-1 896. They then
pairs, equipment, etc., $160,000; northern penitentiary, workshops, tools, and
materials, $250,000; southern penitentiary, the same, $50,000; 1895-1896, asylum
for insane criminals, new building, $20,000; home for juvenile female offenders,
buildings and equipment, $70,000; northern penitentiary, new buildings and
improvements, $130,000; 1897-1898, state reformatory, new cell house, $150,000;
1901-1902, extensive repairs and improvements at all institutions; 1903-1904, home
for delinquent boys, buildings, $210,000; northern penitentiary, materials for
manufacturing, $100,000; state reformatory, repairing buildings damaged by fire,
$75,000; training school for girls, cottages, $36,000; 1905-1906, training school
for girls, cottages, $43,000; home for delinquent boys, new buildings, $150,000;
northern penitentiary, materials, $174,000; 1907-1908, training school for girls,
land and new cottages, $120,000; home for delinquent boys, new buildings, $110,-
ooo. The last few years have seen no expensive new buildings erected, but liberal
allowances have been made for the repair and improvement of existing institu-
tions.
5 1897-1898, repairing and refurnishing executive mansion, $30,000; 1899-
1900, large increase in number of porters, janitors, policemen, and watchmen at
the statehouse; 1905-1906, great reduction in the same forces; 1907-1908, repairs
on the statehouse, $106,029.
STATE FINANCES
429
remained practically stationary for a decade, at the end of
which time the appropriations for the state highway commis-
sion began. These have increased with great rapidity during
the last half decade. 6
The expenditures listed in the table under the title " agri-
culture " are almost entirely devoted to the erection and main-
tenance of buildings at the state fair grounds. In 1905 these
were permanently located at Springfield and were put under the
control of the state board of agriculture. Appropriations for
this object have been continuous from that date to the present.
Larger grants have also been made to county agricultural
boards to assist in paying the expenses of county fairs and of
county farmers' institutes.
It is now generally admitted that there are phases of pri-
vate enterprise in which it is not proper or safe to permit con-
ditions to be determined by unrestricted competition, and other
fields in which competition is inoperative, such as monopolistic
industries. Unless the state itself undertakes the operation
of these enterprises it is therefore necessary for it to super-
vise and regulate the manner and conditions under which pri-
vate individuals or corporations shall carry on these businesses.
There has consequently been a great extension, not only in Illi-
6 The main expenditures in this group are shown in the following table:
BlENNIUM
Illinois
and
Michigan
canal
Arsenal,
armory,
and mu-
seum at
Spring-
field
State
highway
commission
Geological
commissien
Rivers and
lakes com-
mission
l8QVO,4.
$ S,OOO
1807-98.
50,000
i8oQ-oo.
17,385
1901-02.
160,74.9
$1 19,680
1 003-04..
IQ.C27
?O,'? 2O
1905-06.
4O.OOO
Jie.qcK
$33.064
1907-08 .
4.C.OOO
0.6,1140,
63.CO7
IOOQ-IO.
68,2OO
124,08'?
c8,CC4
IQI I-I2 .
7. COO
178. <2Q
74.834
$58 Arc
TQT1-I4. .
2OT.rM4
66656
388 in
430 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
nois but in all industrial states, of expenditures for industrial
supervision and investigation. In this state the increase during
the period under discussion has been almost twelvefold, from
$168,158 in the biennium 1893-1894 to $2,788,396 in the
biennium 19151916. Hardly a year has passed but has seen
the creation of an additional commission or two. Starting
with a single commission in 1871 the railroad and ware-
house commission with an expenditure for the first year of
$18,000, the number has increased to over twenty-five, spend-
ing during the last biennium about $2,800,000. And not
merely has the number of these regulatory agencies rapidly in-
creased, but the expenditures of each separate board or com-
mission has swelled enormously from year to year. Their
rapid expansion may be interpreted as a proof, in general, both
of the need of such agencies and of the value of the services
which they render. Some of the details as to these expendi-
tures are given below. 7
The column headed "refund of taxes improperly paid"
is small, but was not classifiable with any other group. While
there is considerable variation in the amounts, the range
being from $6 to $17,997, even tne highest is so small that it
gives evidence of some care in the collection of taxes.
The expenditures for local bond payments are noteworthy
because they constitute one of the very few groups which shows
a decline. This decrease is especially marked after 1908 and
7 1893-1894, expenditures for insurance superintendent begin here; they
increase from $28,000 to $165,000 during this period; also factory and workshop
inspectors, whose expenditures grow from $17,000 to $203,000; 1895-1896, first
appearance of the state board of arbitration, with expenses from $6,000 to $24,000;
1899-1900, beginning of expenditures for food commissioner, which grow from
$18,000 to $164,000; also free employment bureaus in the larger cities of the state,
with expenditures from $20,000 to 95,000; 1905-1906, first appearance of safety
appliance inspector; 1909-1910, state fire marshal first appears, costing from
$1,750 to $130,000; also mine rescue stations, increasing from $800 to $107,000
and commissioners of mining investigations, spending about $5,000 per biennium;
1911-1912, a large number of new commissions were created this year, among
them the board of dental examiners, board of examiners for barbers, board of
examiners for registered nurses, board of pharmacy, stallion registration board,
inspector of apiaries, and grain inspection office; 1913-1914, this year marks the
beginning of the state industrial board, and of the state public utilities commis-
sion. This group also includes several less important commissions which existed
for a number of years and then disappeared.
STATE FINANCES 431
indicates that the local communities are now beginning to pay
off their indebtedness.
Expenditures for the conservation of fish and game of the
state began in 1879 with the establishment of the fish com-
mission. In 1899 the game commission was provided for, be-
ing given appropriations which grew from three thousand to
two hundred thousand dollars. In 1914 the two were amal-
gamated into the state fish and game conservation commission.
There has been a rapid increase of expenditures for the pur-
pose of conservation of the native fish and fauna of the state,
especially since 1903.
The people of Illinois have testified to their interest in the
history, not only of the state, but of the nation as a whole, by
the expenditures they have made for historic monuments, cele-
brations, and exhibits. Illinois has taken some part in almost
every historic celebration or exhibition held in the United
States during this period. Beginning with the World's Colum-
bian exposition in Chicago in the biennium 1893-1894, which
naturally was the largest, they have continued until the cele-
bration of the one-hundredth anniversary of the entrance of
the state of Illinois into the union. Probably no group of ex-
penditures has yielded or will yield larger returns in patriotism
or in the elevation of standards of achievement and of life
than those here recorded.
The expenditures which are here grouped together under
the title " grants to societies " began in 1 893 with an appropria-
tion of $6,000 to the State Horticultural Society. From that
time to 1910 every session of the legislature saw the addition
of at least one society to the number receiving state aid. The
regularity with which the number has grown is striking: 1895,
State Dairymen's Association; 1897, Poultry and Pet Associa-
tion; 1899, Live Stock Breeders' Association; 1901, State Fire-
men's Association; 1903, Beekeepers' Association; 1905, Milk
Producers' Institute; 1909, Grand Army of the Republic. The
grants in all cases are small, the largest being that of $8,286 to
the last-named organization for the biennium 1913-1914. It
432 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
is apparently the purpose of the legislature to contribute suffi-
cient to pay for printing the reports of the proceedings of the
various societies.
By way of conclusion the expenditures of the state may be
grouped under four or five large purposes. The cost of run-
ning the government administrative, legislative, and judicial,
together with certain other expenses incidental thereto ab-
sorbed about twelve and five-tenths per cent of all the expen-
ditures for the last biennium. Those for carrying out the pro-
tective functions of government militia and penal institutions
were eleven per cent. Public works took two and one-tenth
per cent, and the business of supervising and regulating private
industry by means of commissions cost seven per cent. This
left over two-thirds, or sixty-seven and four-tenths per cent,
to be devoted to what may be called the developmental func-
tions of government, namely education, charitable institutions-,
public health, and similar activities.
The great task of the state government of Illinois is thus
seen to be the development of those lines of public activity
which will best fit its citizens to realize their capacities, and to
promote social activities which will elevate the conditions of
life. Provided the work is economically and efficiently per-
formed there can be no doubt as to its desirability. It is clear
that the state of Illinois is performing services of the very
highest character, which are destined to make it a better place
of residence for succeeding generations.
XX. STATE TAXATION
two things are certain," says an old proverb,
" death and taxes." There is no well-authenticated
evidence as yet that the laws of death have been suspended in
the case of any citizen of Illinois, but in the case of taxes under
the prevailing legislative and administrative system in Illinois
the old proverb must be amended. Taxes are uncertain. The
only thing which is certain is the fact of taxation, for the
state must be supported and an adequate revenue provided.
But as to whether the burden of taxation shall be justly
distributed, equitably assessed, or fairly borne there prevails
only uncertainty. The iniquities of the present system lie
like a blot upon the fair page of Illinois history which these
volumes unfold. It is to be hoped that the opening years
of the second century of the state's history may record their
reform.
State revenues in Illinois are received from various sources,
but by far the most important source is the general property
tax, the yield from this exceeding all other revenues put to-
gether. Next to this come the corporation and inheritance
taxes, and finally a number of fees which for the most part,
however, cover only the expenses of the boards which collect
them. The present system is based upon the revenue law of
1872, which carried out the provisions of the constitution of
1 870, but in reality the general property tax dates from a much
earlier period. Since 1872 the only important addition to the
sources of revenue has been the inheritance tax in 1905, which
was increased and made progressive in 1909. Any account of
the sources of revenue of the state between 1893 an d 1916
must, therefore, be devoted largely to an account of the gen-
eral property tax.
433
434 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
It is obvious that the state of Illinois is committed to an
antiquated system of taxation. While it has shown itself to be
enlightened and progressive in matters of expenditure, on the
side of revenues it is backward and unprogressive. Although
it has developed its mining interests until it ranks as the second
state in the union in this respect, and its manufactures until in
this field it ranks third, it still clings to a system of taxation
which was introduced when the state was almost purely agri-
cultural and which is suited only to rural communities. The
commercial and financial expansion and the extraordinary re-
cent growth of corporate organization are all but ignored, and
the futile attempt is made year after year to fit the economic
frame of our expanding life to the Procrustean bed of an out-
grown system of taxation.
In the administration of the general property tax there are
three distinct steps: first, there is an official assessment or valu-
ation of the property subject to taxation; second, the tax rates
ordered by the various taxing authorities must be determined,
and the amount of taxes against each piece of property or
property owner must be calculated and levied; and third, the
taxes must be collected.
The proper assessment of property presents the greatest
difficulties to be found in connection with the administration of
this tax, and this is true both of real and personal property.
Little change or improvement has been made in this respect in
the last forty-five years, but the important facts for this period
may be noted, especially in their bearing upon present prob-
lems. To set these forth clearly it will be necessary to analyze
the general property tax into its component parts for it con-
sists really of a complex of taxes and to discuss these
separately.
The most important distinction is between real and per-
sonal property. Real estate is defined as "not only the land
itself .... but also all buildings, structures and im-
provements, and other permanent fixtures .... thereon,
and all rights and privileges belonging or in anywise pertaining
STATE TAXATION
435
thereto "* Until 1899 real estate was assessed
annually, but in that year a quadrennial assessment was sub-
stituted with annual additions and corrections. From 1872 to
1898 the statutes prescribed that all property should be as-
sessed at its fair cash value, but this ideal was ever more widely
departed from and finally in 1898 the legislature recognized
the existing undervaluation and declared that thereafter the
assessed valuation for purposes of taxation and limitation of
indebtedness should be one-fifth of the full value. In 1909 this
proportion was raised to one-third. 2 It was apparently thought
that the taxpayers could be tricked into fuller valuations if
they were told that they would be taxed on only a fraction of
what they declared. Illinois is the only state which has legal-
ized a departure from the spirit of the tax law.
Undervaluation has been the greatest evil of the tax sys-
tem in spite of or perhaps because of the provision just
described. In 1896 an investigation of a certain district in
Chicago showed that the taxable real estate was worth $438,-
447,180, while the assessed value was only $40,668,720 or 9.4
per cent. The following table shows the disparity between
true and assessed value for the whole state : 3
COMPARISON OF TRUE AND ASSESSED VALUATION OF REAL ESTATE IN ILLINOIS
YEAR
Estimated true value
of taxable real
estate
Assessed value
Percentage of
assessed to
true value
Legal
ratio
1800. .
$3.108.04.0,060
${87.442.280
18.0
IOO
tooo. .
4,008,676,366
568,368,309
14.2
20
I OO4. .
5,185,946,082
761,039,328
14.7
20
I 12 . .
10.046.310. <I2
1, 648.1; 00,1:46
1 6. 4
t4
From these figures it is clear that at no time has there been
even an approach to full valuation. The law of 1898, instead
of bringing about an agreement between the facts and the stat-
1 Laws of 1871-1872, p. 69.
2 Ibid., 2, 3 ; Laws of 1898, p. 40-41, 43 ; Laws of IQOQ-IQIO, p. 308.
3 Based upon United States census reports on wealth, debt, and taxation.
436 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
utes, simply stimulated to further undervaluation and two
years later the assessed valuation was one-seventh of the true
value. When the legal ratio was made one-third, it pulled up
the actual valuation slightly, but still left it almost exactly half
of what the law called for.
Even greater than this evil, serious as it is, is another one
which is closely connected with this, namely inequality in assess-
ment. As soon as the assessor forsakes the standard of exact
and full valuation he is left without guide or restraint and is
exposed to the importunities of every taxpayer, who presses al-
ways for a reduction in his assessment. The result is that the
greatest inequalities are introduced as between districts, kinds
of property, and individuals. Thus different parts of the state
show varying results according to the honesty or efficiency of
the local assessors. In 1912 the percentage of assessed to true
valuation for the whole state was 16.4, but in Alexander county
it was 37.1, in Hardin it was 31.9; in Coles, 15.1; and in
Kankakee, 14.7.*
Also two different kinds of real estate are assessed at dif-
ferent ratios. Town lots are assessed at a relatively higher
rate than farm lands. 5 The rapid increase in the value of farm
lands since 1900 has not been reflected in the assessed valua-
tions. Between 1900 and 1910 the value of farm lands in the
state almost exactly doubled, but the assessors' valuations in-
creased less than one-third.
A still more irritating and unjust discrimination is that
between large and small holdings. Thus in 1893 m Chicago
thirty pieces of choice residence property, worth $20,000 and
above, were assessed at from 4 to 12 per cent of the true value
of the property, but eighty pieces of property, selling for less
than $4,000 each, were assessed at from 12 to 40 per cent of
the true value. 6
Wherever similar investigations have been made it has
4 Thirteenth Census of United States, 6:427, 430; Wealth, Debt, and Taxa-
tion, 1913, 1:23, 759.
5 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 92.
8 Report of the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 1894, p. 88, 92-94.
STATE TAXATION 437
been found that the smaller property has been assessed at the
higher rate. Such discriminations are made possible just as
soon as the rule of full valuation is departed from. The
revenue commission of 1886 reported on this point that "the
realty of one man is assessed at one-third, one-half, two-thirds,
or even full measure of its actual value ; while that of his neigh-
bor is assessed at one-sixth, one-tenth, one-twentieth, or as was
shown in one case of considerable magnitude, one-twenty-fifth
of its actual value. .... Such distinctions are too
invidious to be meekly borne." 7 The same facts and conclu-
sions hold with equal truth for today.
The work of assessing property for taxation is performed
for the most part by local officials. In counties not under
township organization the county treasurer is ex officio county
assessor, and appoints deputy assessors. In counties under
township organization assessors are elected in each township
for a period of two years. Cook county was made an excep-
tion by an act of 1898, and there a county board of five asses-
sors, elected for six years, exists; this board appoints deputy
assessors for the townships which lie within the city of Chicago.
The change in the manner of selecting these officials was made
because the earlier system of elective township assessors had
proven unsatisfactory, inefficient, and corrupt. 8 In general
throughout the state the local assessor is the key to the effi-
cient administration of the general property tax, for upon his
initial valuation rests very largely the success or failure of the
whole system.
The assessor is required, before June i of every fourth
year, actually to view and determine as nearly as practicable
the value of all real estate listed for taxation. In the case of
personal property the owner is supposed to list it, but in practice
most of the personal property returned for taxation is assessed
by the assessor. Boards of review and equalization are pro-
vided for in order to correct mistakes and inequalities, but the
7 Report of the Re-venue Commission, 1902, p. iii-iv.
8 Law s of 1898, p. 36, 37-38; Laws of 1903, p. 299-300; Chicago Tribune,
February 25, 1898; Sparling, Municipal History of Chicago, 106.
438 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
changes made by them in the original assessments are few in
number and insignificant in amount. Everything depends then
upon the exactness and fairness of the initial work of the local
assessor.
The general system of township assessors was sharply at-
tacked in the report of the revenue commission of 1886. They
recommended the abolition of the township assessor and the
substitution of a county assessor elected for four years, with
power to appoint deputies, but no action was ever taken on this
recommendation. Again in 1910 the special tax commission
appointed by the governor under act of June 9, 1909, repeated
substantially the same recommendation. 9 They believed this
system would " provide a more efficient means for making fair
and equitable local assessments of property for purposes of
taxation." This report too suffered the common fate of most
reform suggestions.
The system of review and equalization was developed in an
attempt to correct the evils which had arisen from the unequal
valuation of property in different districts. The theory was
that the assessments made by the local assessors should be
checked up, corrected, and compared with the valuations
arrived at by other assessors, and any omissions, inequali-
ties, or undervaluations corrected. 10 Previous to 1898 town
assessments were subject to review by a town board of re-
view, consisting of the town supervisor, assessor, and clerk,
but by the act of 1898, this town board was abolished,
and increased powers over assessments were given to county
officials. 11
In each county there is provided a county board of
review. In counties not under township organization this
consists of the board of county commissioners. In counties
under township organization it consists of the chairman of
the county board and two citizens, one from each of the
9 Report of the Revenue Commission, 1886, p. vi-vii; Special Tax Commis-
sion Report, 7-13.
10 Haig, History of the General Property Tax in Illinois, 173.
11 Laws of 1898, p. 46.
STATE TAXATION 439
leading political parties, appointed each year by the county
judge. In Cook county a board of review of three members
is elected for six years, one member being elected every two
years.
Little can be expected of the system that prevails in the
counties under township organization, where annual appoint-
ments bring untrained and usually uninterested men to the
board. In the case of Cook county, where long tenure should
secure expert service, it has been charged that members of
this board have made use of their office to aid their private
business. Of recent years little complaint has been made.
The functions of the county board of review are four: it may
add property omitted from the assessment roll; it may remove
property from the lists which is entitled to exemption; it may
correct individual assessments; and it may increase or reduce
the- entire assessment of either real or personal property so as
to equalize the assessment between sections of the county or
between classes of property. 12
The last step in determining the valuation of property
assessed by local assessors is the equalization of county valua-
tions by the state board of equalization. This body consists
of the auditor of public accounts and one member elected for
a term of four years from each of the twenty-five congressional
districts. The board has power to increase or decrease the
aggregate amounts of the county valuation so as to make the
assessments in one county bear a just relation to the assessments
in other counties in the state. Before 1898 the total amount
of increase or decrease by the board might not exceed five per
cent of the total assessed value of property in the state, except
for railroad property; but since 1898 the limit has been
raised to ten per cent. 13 The work of the board has become
more and more perfunctory and inefficient and in recent years
has amounted to practically nothing. In the five years 1909
1914 only twenty-nine changes were made from the returns of
12 Report of Illinois Tax Reform Association, 1908, p. 6, 7; Laivs of 1898,
p. 47-48.
13 Ibid., p. 52.
440 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the county boards for the entire state, and in three of these
years no changes at all were reported. 14
Against the state board of equalization as at present con-
stituted there has been directed a steady and unanimous stream
of criticism and condemnation. The revenue commission of
1886 characterized as "arbitrary and unjust" the equaliza-
tion between counties by the state board. 15 Governor Altgeld
in 1895 charged that the changes in valuations made by the
board represented " simply an effort by one or more sections
of the State to throw the burden onto some other portion of
the State." 16 A well-known publicist described the present
board in 1909 as "a clumsy and ineffective body." 17 The
special tax commission of 1910, while less outspoken in its
disapproval, recommended the substitution of a small perma-
nent tax commission for the present board. But the most
violent attack upon the board has been made by one of its own
members, after the completion of the year's work in I9I3. 18
According to his testimony the committees to which is referred
the actual task of equalization perform their work in a hasty
and perfunctory manner; their meetings are "a pefect bur-
lesque." "The custom has been never to raise the assessments
in a county unless the member from that district gives his
consent." Here is an explanation of the small number of
changes made by the board in recent years.
Personal property is not formally defined by the tax laws,
although real estate is. It may therefore be considered to
consist of all property not specifically exempt, or taxed as real
estate. The schedule furnished to the taxpayers by the as-
sessor contains a list of thirty-six items, which may be re-
grouped under the following three heads : tangible property,
not ordinarily productive of money income, such as household
furniture, pianos, sewing machines, watches, etc. ; tangible prop-
14 Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 105.
15 Report of the Revenue Commission, 1902, p. n, 12, 13.
18 Senate Journal, 1895, 23.
17 Fairlie, Report on the Taxation and Revenue System of Illinois, 65.
18 H. T. Nightingale, in letters to the Chicago Record-Herald, November 25,
1913 and Evamton Press, December 6, 1913.
STATE TAXATION 441
erty which is productive, as livestock, agricultural implements,
manufacturers' machinery and stocks, merchandise, etc. ; and
intangible property, including such items as money, stocks,
bonds, credits, etc.
The law provides that every person of full age and sound
mind, being a resident of the state, shall list all his moneys,
credits, and other personal property. 19 It is further provided
that persons required to list personal property shall make out
under oath a schedule of all their taxable personal property.
Upon their failure to do so, the assessor shall list and assess
it according to his best information. With respect to most
of the items of tangible personalty and practically all the
intangible personalty, the system is necessarily one of self-
assessment. It is not easy to estimate exactly the efficiency of
the assessment of personalty in Illinois because the statis-
tics do not furnish full information, but from all available
data it is clear that the system has completely broken down
and that the assessment of personal property is a farce if
not worse.
One test of the completeness of assessment of personal
property is to note the relation which it bears to real estate.
The following table shows these facts since 1851 : 20
ASSESSMENT OF REAL ESTATE AND PERSONAL PROPERTY, 1851-1916
YEAH
Real estate
Personal property
Per cent
personal
1851
$86."; 12, 537
$75.51 5.708
27.8
jgfo
238.858.8nq
8o.72O.o 1 8
2<.2
1871. .
364,622,620
112,458,104
21.$
i8?3
8Q7,6l 5,103
3O4. {18,34.0
2C.2
1881
566,270,710
168.674.777
22.0
1891
502, 766,180
143,520,274
iQ.6
1898
E72. 777. 684
114 21 5.OO7
i6.<;
1901
IiT4.6.7.'l,1 l 6?2
J5 C I36.24O
22.6
jqii
1,633 456.568
462.7IQ.I74
22.O
205 5.4O2 715
<o8.Q54.Q7O
14 4
10 Laws of 18^1-1872, p. 3-4, 7-8.
~ Report of the Efficiency and Economy Committee, 94.
442 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
There is here shown a steady decline in personal property
assessments from 1851 to 1898, since which year there has
been a slight improvement. But there can be no doubt in the
mind of anyone familiar with the rapid industrial development
of the state in the last half century and of the multiplication of
all forms of intangible wealth, such as bonds, stocks, credits,
and other paper evidences, that the relation between realty and
personalty is probably one of equality rather than of six to
one.
If particular items are considered in the list of intangible
personalty there will be found still more glaring inequalities.
In the following table are given the assessed values of credits : 21
ASSESSED VALUE OF CREDITS, NOT INCLUDING BANKERS' CREDITS, 1875-1916
YEAR
State Cook county
YEAR
State Cook county
T^TC
1900
.... $22,181,440 $2,819,312
T So
IQO5- .
.... 21,467,724 2,751,212
l885
11 IO2 J.O8 2CO23Q
I9IO
38,681,356 4,063,277
l80O
II 17 C -280 IOO C^C
38,194,460 5,315,282
i8oc. .
10,342,774 67.66O
Under the definition of credits, other than bankers' credits,
the chief item is mortgages. It does not need a detailed knowl-
edge of investments or of mortgage records in Illinois to
realize that undervaluation and evasion is the rule in the assess-
ment of these forms of wealth. The slight gains as a result of
the legalization of undervaluation by the laws of 1898 and
1909 are by no means commensurate with the growth in popula-
tion or in mortgage indebtedness. There are also wide varia-
tions as between different parts of the state. It is not unrea-
sonable to assume that at least as many credits are owned by
city people as by country people. Yet in 1895 Cook county,
which contained one-third of the population, returned only
one hundred and fifty-fourth of the credits listed for taxation. 22
21 Haig, History of General Property Tax in Illinois, 147
22 Ibid., 148.
STATE TAXATION
443
Since the revision of the law in 1898 some improvement in the
distribution between counties has been made.
Another item which may be used as a test of the success of
the assessors in listing personal property is that of bankers'
credits. In brief this is the amount remaining after subtract-
ing from the checks, accounts receivable, and discounts the
deposits and accounts payable; the difference is taxed under
this head. The following table shows the amount of these
credits : 23
ASSESSED VALUE OF BANKERS' CREDITS, 1875-1916
YEAR
Sate
Cook county
YEAR
State Cook county
187?. .
$I.QC1.221
$140.^71
1900
$1.010.722 $ 2l6. ^66
1880
I.4.I4..Q7I
{{,142
I QO { . .
1,{10.O{8 233.OI3
1885
1. 317. 1 Id.
105,610
IQIO. .
.... 7 180020 1,686 397
1890
I. OCO.48Q
10.108
1916
8.216, Q4{ 2.^28.421
i8o"5. .
1.724.611
12,225
It is clear from these few figures that the amounts listed
under this item are insignificant. In 1893 the net taxable
credits of the state banks of Chicago, as shown from reports
made to the auditor, amounted to $2,497,722; the assessment
of credits for that year for all the state banks in Chicago was
$22,375 or about one per cent. The same situation is dis-
closed in the item of money.
It may be objected that these are all but impossible of
ascertainment because they are intangible, easily concealed, and
only disclosed by the owner himself, and hence do not afford
a fair test. Let there be considered, therefore, another
group, which consists of items not so easily concealed, namely
tangible nonproductive property. A study of the returns of
these articles as given in the auditor's reports reveals some
curious situations. Thus it would appear that in the forty
years between 1873 arj d 1916 the value of sewing and knitting
machines has declined from $3,336,817 to $679,800. Simi-
23 Haig, History of General Property Tax in Illinois, 154.
444 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
larly the value of watches and clocks fell off from $1,949,401
to $589,102. In 1916 there were listed in Cook county
15,489 watches and clocks, or about one to every one hundred
and seventy-seven of the population. 24 One is tempted to
parody Goldsmith's well-known lines and to describe Illinois
as a state
". to hastening ills a prey,
Where men accumulate and wealth decays."
In fact the only group which shows even an approach to
accuracy is that of tangible productive property, consisting of
livestock, agricultural implements, manufactured goods and
machinery, merchandise, etc. But the very success of the
assessors in listing the articles in this group throws an addi-
tional burden upon owners of real estate, who are already
bearing a disproportionate share of the burden under the
general property tax. The following table shows in brief the
relation which these three groups of taxable property held to
each other in the past forty years : 25
ASSESSED VALUATION OF PERSONAL PROPERTY IN ILLINOIS, 1873-1913
By groups
YEAR
Tangible
productive
Tangible
non-productive
Intangible
1871. .
$176,177.0^4
$27,34.8. 8 ";8
$74.100.232
1898
66,517,006
X.HQ.6<3
3 1. 822.42 C
IQOI . .
77 486 Ol6
12 76l I7O
IO7 7J.J-.l6o
IQI3
I <Q.6 ? I.OIO
25,021,268
168.702,000
The second step in the administration of the general prop-
erty tax is the levy and extension of taxes. When the state
board of equalization has completed its work, then the base of
the tax is fixed; and against the various amounts are charged
the taxes according to the rates determined by the proper
authorities. In Illinois the rate actually levied is a combina-
tion of state, county, city or village, road and bridge, school,
24 Auditor's Report, 1912, p. 426.
25 Based on auditors' reports.
STATE TAXATION 445
poor, and other rates, all of which are certified to the county
clerk, who combines them and calculates how much each tax-
payer must pay.
The final step is the collection of taxes. This had already
been well worked out when the new revenue law of 1872 was
adopted, and little change has been made since. In counties
under township organization, taxes are collected by town col-
lectors, the county treasurer being the county collector. In
counties not under township organization, the sheriff is both
county collector and district collector.
In addition to the taxation of individuals the property and
corporate excess of corporations are also taxed under the gen-
eral property tax. But the machinery by which these are ascer-
tained and valued is different in the case of railroads and other
corporations from that just described for the assessment of
the property of individuals, although the final assessed valua-
tions are all taxed alike at the rate of the general property tax.
The assessment process must therefore be described separately,
even though the receipts are not distinguishable in the financial
reports of the state officers.
The law of 1872 empowered the state board of equaliza-
tion to assess the rolling stock and railroad track of railroad
companies and capital stock of corporations organized under
the laws of Illinois. In 1873 tne state board adopted rules
providing that the value of the capital stock of each company
should be determined by adding together the market value of
the stocks and bonds and subtracting therefrom the assessed
value of the tangible property. The value of the tangible
property was to be assessed locally as before in the same man-
ner as the property of individuals.
The first assessment by the state board, 1873, made large
additions to the total assessed property valuations, the value
of railroad track and rolling stock amounting to $59,317,408
and the excess value of the capital stock of railroads to $64,-
611,071, while the corporate excess assessments on corpora-
tions other than railroads was $21,898,451. This was the
446 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
high water mark for thirty-five years, for until 1909 these
assessments were not equalled in the case of railroads and only
once (in 1902) in the case of other corporations. The total
assessment on railroads by the state board fell to $40,461,865
in 1878, and after that rose again very steadily until it reached
$110,397,824 in 1908; the change in the law the following
year, making the assessed value one-third instead of one-fifth
of the real value, had the effect of bringing up the assessment
in 1909 to $186,514,540. The following table shows the
essential facts :
RAILROAD ASSESSMENTS IN ILLINOIS, 1873-1916 26
YEAR
Equalized local
assessments
Assessed by state board of
equalization
Total equalized
assessment
R. R. track and
rolling stock
Capital
stock
1875 . .
$9,592,154
5,673,477
2,763,444
2,065,419
2,336,128
2,245,9 I 3
2,746,649
4,094,029
7,690,788
8,669,219
$ 59,317,408
32,163,644
44,601,815
60,987,317
72,974,396
79,319,385
77,878,672
91,748,866
177,217,518
191,175,626
$64,611,071
22,649,222
$133,520,633
60,486,343
47,365,259
63,052,736
75,310,524
81,565,298
60,627,321
97,728,276
187,019,990
202,625,704
18??. .
1880
1885..
1800. .
i8oc. .
IQOO. .
IQOC . .
1,885,381
2,111,684
2,780,859
IQIO. .
1016 . .
Substantially the same thing as has been described for rail-
roads has also been true of the assessments on the capital stock
of corporations other than railroads, except that a significant
increase occurred in the latter case at a somewhat earlier date,
namely 1901, which calls for some further explanation. The
great increase in 1901 was due to litigation brought on by the
Teachers' Federation of Chicago.
The work of the schools had been hampered by lack of
funds in 1899 and 1900, and a new scale of salaries adopted
26 Compiled from Proceedings of the Illinois State Board of Equalization.
STATE TAXATION 447
in 1898 was held up for the same reason. 27 The only way to
secure more funds was to have more taxes collected and before
this could be done the tax base must be increased. Upon
looking into the revenue situation the Teachers' Federation
found plenty of abuses, but selected the assessment of the cap-
ital stock of corporations as the source which might be made
to yield the largest returns with the least public antagonism.
The assessments of twenty-three public service corporations
were chosen for attack in a test case upon the lax and inefficient
assessment methods of the state board of equalization. The
federation claimed that the real value of the securities of these
companies was $268,108,312, but most of them were assessed
nothing at all upon their corporate excess, in spite of the fact
that their tangible property was greatly undervalued by the
local assessors. After petitioning in vain to have the board
assess the corporations properly under their own rules,
adopted in 1873, tne Y brought mandamus proceedings to com-
pel the board to act. After legal proceedings had begun the
state board adopted a new set of rules and assessed seven of
the twenty-three companies for small amounts. In 1901 the
circuit court held that the new rules were invalid and the assess-
ments fraudulent and granted the. mandamus to compel the
reassessment of twenty corporations under the former rules of
the board.
This decision was upheld by the supreme court of the
state, 28 but it was carried to the federal circuit court, which
held that the assessment was made under duress and that it
was not upon a proper basis, but should have been on the capi-
talization of net earnings. On this basis an additional assess-
ment of $7,190,000 was made upon the companies, giving a
total of $21,034,000 on which they paid taxes. This amount
was increased slightly in 1902, but during the next five years
there was a steady decrease until in 1907 the assessed valuation
of capital stock was only $10,608,000 or less than half what
27 Chicago Tribune, October 14, 1900.
28 Ibid., October 9, 1900; State Board of Equalization <v. People, 191
Illinois, 528.
448 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
it was in 1901. The change in the legal assessment ratio from
one-fifth to one-third brought up assessments in 1909 to the
highest point yet reached, namely $35,394,441 ; but immedi-
ately thereafter they began to decline again, until they have
now fallen below the old low level of 1901. These facts are
shown in the following table : 29
CAPITAL STOCK ASSESSMENTS OF ILLINOIS CORPORATIONS OTHER THAN RAILROADS,
1873-1916
YEAR
No. of cor-
porations
assessed
Value of capital
stock reported
Equalized value
of capital stock
and franchise
Equalized value
of tangible
property
Net assessment
of capital stock
1873
2O7
$2O.73O,OS7
1874....
f,\j I
224
$ 40,777,920
$25,118,105
$13,398,889
f** v , / j*-',^* j i
11,719,216
I7S
iggo
100
20
28,750,356
10,283,176
7,285,636
4,802,112
2,i7Q,4-6o
1885
m y
114
54,832,525
9,078,083
5,286,460
>*/ y*r vv
3,791,623
1890
305
100,842,771
14,582,584
9,007,615
6,956,909
1895....
252
179,177.258
14,975,288
10,192,779
4,782,509
1900
266
236,067,920
25,897,808
21,089,178
4,808,630
1901
328
287,948,878
78,552,218
57,074,275
21,477,943
1905....
i, 218
304,407,993
37,933,879
24,990,909
12,942,970
1910
1,078
269,467,110
89,822,370
63,088,122
26,734,248
1916
580
266,002,919
66,840,464
52,203,246
14,632,218
Whether the inefficiency and laxness of the board is due
to corruption, as charged by the Illinois Tax Reform Associa-
tion, or to its large size and elective character, as suggested by
the special tax commission of 1910, it is clear that nothing can
be hoped for from this source. 30 The work of original assess-
ment now assigned to it could certainly be performed more effi-
ciently and probably at no greater expense by a small expert
tax commission.
Next to the receipts from the general property tax the
largest single source of revenue to the state is the payments by
the Illinois Central railroad, amounting for the year ending
28 Compiled from Proceedings o/ the Illinois State Board o/ Equalization.
30 Report of special tax commission in Governor's Special Message, January
31, 1911, p. 10.
STATE TAXATION
449
tx O to vn ts. t^
oo to M c$ *$- to
to N ft O HI so
O t^ HI N Os
N oo to \o to t^ *J- o\ vo IN HI MOOOO t^NOO tr\
N N O'vvo O\\O w> rh T^ >H t^ ui Q O\O\N wvO
tON NVO^O OOO t^.t^O\O w ONVO O <*>f>.
11
SO to VO
to HI N
O M o
O r*.*t-<*>M ovoo^o
^- O O <*> v o f
*N to fx, N HI OK
OS O '
^ jf 4 j
IN N M to ft 5
^ N" to
t^txt^NOO O M<^,
tOHc O O V' M %fl to'
mvo tooo vou^vo t^os
O N
>-c ^-
*^ IN OS N l^
Os vo" oo" rf 10
3-5-
N t^ OO IN OO rt- IN
IN M tOOOOOOO
vo O
M ONNOO
ot c M M in p
* o E
SSS^
w
oooooooooooooooooooooooooooo
O IN IN IN M
ONOOS>OS
450 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
October 31, 1916, to $ 1 ,6 1 7,9 1 9. This road is not taxed as are
other railroads but pays to the state seven per cent of its gross
receipts in lieu of all taxes. This payment is in return for
considerable railroad property which was given the railroad
after the breakdown of the state internal improvement scheme
and more especially for a princely grant of land which had
been assigned to the state by congress for that purpose. 31
The tax on inheritances brings in increasingly large returns.
This tax was imposed in 1895 and was revised and the rates
increased in 1909. Considerable sums are also obtained from
taxes on insurance and telegraph companies, and from fees.
These are all shown in the table on the preceding page. 32
The injustice and inadequacy of the general property tax
as a source of state revenue, especially for such a large propor-
tion of state receipts, has long led to criticism. Demand for
reform has always been met by legislative inaction or trifling
changes in existing law. A step forward was, however, taken
in 1915 when the legislature voted to submit to the people an
amendment to the constitution permitting the classification of
personal property for purposes of taxation. This was ap-
proved in November of that year by popular vote. It is now
made possible to impose taxes upon corporate property at a
higher rate or upon intangible personal property at a lower
rate than real estate. This method has already been adopted
by Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Maryland, Minnesota, and
Iowa; and it offers a measure of relief from the present evil of
evasion on the part of intangible personalty. Thus far, how-
ever, no change has been made in the statute law.
The other parts of the tax system call for little or no crit-
icism. The framework of a good revenue system is provided,
which can be expanded as need arises. As in other industrial
states among which Illinois must now be classed corpora-
tion and inheritance taxes furnish the bulk of the revenues.
These should be developed to meet the growing needs of the
31 Tenth Census of United States, ^ : 625.
82 Fairlie, Taxation and Revenue System of Illinois, 244.
STATE TAXATION 451
state and dependence upon the general property correspond-
ingly lessened. Too long has inertia prevented Illinois from
taking the leading position in this field to which it is entitled by
reason of its financial, commercial, and industrial preeminence.
XXI. ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR
BY ARTHUR C. COLE
IN THE early months of 1917 the American nation was
called upon to decide a momentous question, whether or
not to abandon the national isolation which had thus far saved
it from fearful modern warfare with its ravenous appetite for
life and property. For two and a half years Europe had been
a seething mass of battling and suffering humanity; was this
great peaceful republic now to be dragged into the maelstrom ?
This was the question on every tongue as people watched the
failure of the president's appeal for peace without victory for
either side.
The announcement of Germany's intention to undertake
an aggressive submarine campaign against the Entente powers
precipitated an unavoidable diplomatic break with the Teutonic
nations. That war should of necessity follow this break was
not believed by most Illinoisians. That events might rapidly
and inevitably shape their course in that direction did seem
probable to many clear-headed observers; moreover, there
were many who in violation of President Wilson's early injunc-
tion of neutral-mindedness had come to expect little of good
from the Central powers and who were already cataloging the
sins of the Teutons against humanity. The vast body of the
citizenry waited patiently for advice from the national execu-
tive, feeling that he held the key to American policy and that
his recommendations ought to be backed at all hazards.
As the clouds of war gathered, the various elements that
hoped that the arbitrament of the sword might be avoided
began to bestir themselves to influence public opinion. The
most significant single group in Illinois was doubtless the Ger-
man element. The German born population of Illinois in 1910
numbered 319,199, a 13.7 per cent decrease for the previous
452
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 453
decade, though still the largest number in any state in the
union; there were also 163,065 Austrian born residents in the
state, most of them newcomers, since the increase for the
decade was 95,952.* The German- Americans, claiming that
they were more American than their "unneutral and pro-
British" critics, could not easily adjust themselves to the
international crisis. 2 They recalled the visit of Prince Henry
when the traditional friendship between the United States and
Germany was firmly sealed. While to many a clash with Great
Britain seemed possible, hostility to the Central powers
appeared almost an impossibility. 3
The sympathy with the fatherland had found expression
in a number of activities looking toward relief of the wounded,
the crippled, and the widows of those fallen in battle. Societies
were organized with the object of gathering material and
funds for that purpose; fairs and bazaars were arranged to
which the German-American population contributed with the
utmost liberality. In Chicago, soon after the outbreak of
hostilities, the German and Austro-Hungarian Relief Society
was formed under a charter from the state of Illinois. This
1 These two groups led the foreign born elements and constituted consider-
ably over one-third of the foreign born population of the state. These immi-
grants from the domains of the Central powers were scattered through the
state with especial strength in the cities, particularly in Chicago. Of the two
million residents of Chicago, only 445,139 were native born of native parentage,
while 643,733 were of German and Austrian birth or parentage. In addition,
since German immigrants had steadily made a significant contribution to the
population of Illinois, hundreds of thousands of Illinois citizens belonged in
whole or in part to the same stock. Divided in religion, in politics, and in
social and economic standing, this population element responded to a strong
cultural bond which it found in the messages of the German newspapers of
the state. Their journals had a combined circulation of a half-million.
N. W . Ayer and Son's Newspaper Annual and Directory, 1916, p. 1277.
2 To be sure, their sympathies at the beginning of the world war had been
strongly with the German cause. Inclined to accept the interpretation that the
Allies were the aggressors in the war, those of German descent or birth nat-
urally sympathized with their kin across the water. They did not see in this
a divided allegiance, or a defect in loyalty.
3 This point of view had been stimulated by republican politicians, includ-
ing German-American leaders, during the presidential canvass of 1916. Dele-
gations of German republicans waited upon the editor of the Chicago Abendpost
to secure a promise to support the candidacy of Hughes as more favorable to
the German point of view ; when the editor refused he was denounced as
pro-British and a tool of Northcliffe, and threats were made to boycott his
paper.
454 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
society, active until the break of diplomatic relations, by vari-
ous means succeeded in collecting almost a million dollars to be
devoted to the alleviation of suffering in the warring countries. 4
This work of charity received considerable recognition by the
American Red Cross and by government officials.
When now the war clouds appeared on the horizon, many
German-Americans hoped that the government would find it
unnecessary to resort to the ultima ratio regum. Some felt that
this would be a concession to British influence, in favor of
crushing Germany, "a nation of peace-lovers, who are fight-
ing in desperation for their existence and have made the first
move for peace;" 5 others believed that the vital reason for
entry into the war was the fact that without American assist-
ance the Allies were beaten. Many hoped, from the broad
humanitarian course which President Wilson had followed in
directing American neutrality, that, in the interest of humanity,
he would now see how much more valuable it might be to
reserve the vigor and power of this great nation for the time
when America could act as the arbiter, as the champion of
right and justice, rather than as a party in the cruel and bloody
broil. All these ideas found expression in the German lan-
guage press and in protests to the regular newspapers; in the
course of time it seemed wise to bring them more directly to
the attention of the government. On April I twenty-five
German-Americans, under the leadership of Gustave Jacobson,
Rudolph Seifert, and Julius Goldzier, left Chicago for Wash-
ington, to make an effort to persuade President Wilson that
America ought not to enter the war on the side of the Allies. 6
4 One of the devices was the sale of four-inch replicas of the iron cross
for use as paper weights. The funds collected were dedicated exclusively to
the assistance of noncombatants. The chief channel through which the dona-
tions of the different societies went was the German and Austrian Red Cross.
6 Chicago Tribune, March 17, 1917. Some earnestly believed that "nothing
that Germany has done to us has emanated from a spirit of calculated aggres-
siveness. That she has sinned there is no doubt. That we join the allies
against her is morally wrong." Ibid., March 31, 1917.
Ibid., March 31, April 2, 1917. Horace L. Brand, editor of the Illinois
Staals-Zeitung, and other leaders declined invitations to a patriotic mass
meeting in Chicago, March 31, because they were not given assurances as to
the resolutions that were to be presented.
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 455
Other less responsible leaders pursued underground tactics and
lent themselves to the more insidious influences of the German
government's spy system.
Likewise pleading for the policy of American noninterven-
tion was an indefinable group that had come to hope that the
day was past when any attempt would be made to solve grave
international issues by war. How many optimistically held to
this faith it is not easy to calculate. Some were passive, mild-
mannered humanitarians who would march with the progress
of public opinion; others belonged to that body of fine ideal-
ists, persons of sincerity and intellectual conviction, who would
struggle for their principles to the point even of becoming
martyrs for opinion's sake. 7 From both groups there came
the plea that the war god be not set up in the shrines of liberty-
loving Americans. Through the medium of the Illinois and
Chicago branches of' the American Peace Society, the American
Union Against Militarism, and similar organizations, Illinois
had trained a body of active spokesmen for this ideal: among
others, Jane Addams, Jenkin Lloyd Jones, Louis P. Lochner,
Robert M. Lovett, Harriet Park Thomas, and Irwin St. John
Tucker. All these had been consistent and determined foes of
war and active in winning others to their point of view even
before a Woodrow Wilson could pronounce a man " too proud
to fight." Many of these now cooperated with the Emergency
Peace League, which was organized to influence the govern-
ment at Washington to labor for a continuance of American
neutrality.
The socialists formed another anti-war group, dogmatic-
ally inclined to oppose all international strife. They had pro-
claimed socialism " the only real force in the world that makes
for universal peace." 8 Prepared by over two years of analysis
of the European war psychosis they now lined up their forces
7 Chicago Tribune, April 4, 1917.
8 Charles Edward Russell, "The Church and Socialism," reprinted from
the Churchman. Russell ^continued: "Modern wars are of economic origin,
and spring from competition. Socialism alone proposes to abolish war by
abolishing its one cause. . . . The truth of all this is demonstrated by the
war that began in Europe on August i, 1914."
456 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
to protest a clash of arms ; war, they held, would only line the
pockets of Rockefeller, Morgan, and Schwab of Wall street
and the munitions manufacturers. From the national head-
quarters of the socialist party at Chicago there emanated
through the columns of the American Socialist, the party's
official weekly organ, a steady appeal for peace, while speak-
ers like John C. Kennedy and W. E. Rodriguez, members of
the Chicago city council, together with A. Germer, Irwin St.
John Tucker, and Seymour Stedman, took the platform to
plead the same cause. 9 On March 19, the socialist party na-
tional committee in session at Chicago called an emergency
national convention to meet at St. Louis early in April for the
purpose of protesting officially against the entry of the United
States into war.
Labor was restive under the burden of its special problems
and under a growing prejudice against international blood-
shed. Throughout the nation labor smarted under the sentence
of death recently meted out to Thomas Mooney, a labor
leader, who had been found guilty of complicity in a bomb
explosion which had cost the lives of several people on the
occasion of a preparedness parade at San Francisco in Septem-
ber, 1916. The trial was proclaimed "a breakdown of law
and justice ;" the Chicago Federation of Labor arranged for
a tremendous protest mass meeting on March 25, before which
W. Bourke Cockran, Mooney's attorney, declared this issue
deeper than the war crisis. 10 Meantime a formidable peace
party was making its appearance in nearly every labor organi-
zation in the state.
The remoteness of the European conflict, combined with
9 This was in spite of the fact of a bitter hatred toward the kaiser even
among the German born members of the party. So uncompromising had been
their criticism of the German autocracy that the Chicaoo Tribune denounced
it as fanatical. See issue of January 20, 1879. When Piince Henry was enter-
tained at Chicago as the guest of Governor Yates and Mayor Harrison, Seymour
Stedman declined an invitation to honor a member of the Hohenzollern family
by his attendance, an action enthusiastically applauded by all socialists. Illinois
State Journal, November 29, 1917.
10 Chicago Tribune, March 26, 1917. " How can we engage in a foreign
war," Cockran asked, " if here in the heart of the country there is a conspiracy
to destroy the structure of the government?"
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 457
a lack of real popular interest in international relations, left
a vast mass of the citizens inert and unresponsive to the cham-
pions of an appeal to arms. This element gave scarcely more
of a hearing to the active champions of peace; time and the
course of events alone could determine what path it would
choose to pursue.
While the rising tide of wrath against the offensive policies
of the German government was being combated by these paci-
fist forces, Governor Frank O. Lowden at the helm in the
state capitol prepared calmly for the worst and gave orders in
no uncertain tone. He demanded aggressive and efficient per-
formance of every duty to the state and the nation. 11 When,
on February 3, the news came that the American government
had severed diplomatic relations with the German empire,
Governor Lowden immediately telegraphed to President Wil-
son a promise of his cooperation and gave out a statement
calling upon the people of Illinois to rally to the hearty support
of the national government. Three days later he appealed in
person to the general assembly to lay aside party creeds and
sympathies as between the warring nations and to give the
president, in the crisis, the whole-hearted support of Illinois.
Resolutions had already been framed declaring that Illinois
would stand by President Wilson in the pending crisis, and on
February 7 these were adopted by both houses with promptness
and unanimity.
Governor Lowden took his stand on the assumption that
security against possible war depended upon the hearty and
united action of the American people. Many Illinoisians be-
lieved, moreover, that America's entry into the world war
would hasten the end of the struggle; they accepted the jour-
nalistic prophecy of Charles Edward Russell that the moral
supoort of the United States would in itself be sufficient to
11 In his inaugural address on January 8, 1917, he made no direct reference
to the great war, but pointed to its administrative lessons as demonstrating " that
democracy must function better in the future than it has in the past." This
alone suggested " a man who has in mind the situation in which this country
would be placed by a catastrophe such as that which overtook Europe." Illinois
State Journal, January 9, 10, 1917.
458 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
show the German people the hopelessness of the cause into
which the kaiser and the German militarists had led them and
that peace would follow within ninety days without a single
sacrifice by the American nation. 12 Few advocates of Amer-
ican participation in the war even imagined that such a course
would require the sending of an expeditionary force to the
European battlefields.
This belief reconciled many to the inevitability of a declara-
tion of war and made easy the plans which Governor Lowden,
with the assistance of Adjutant General Frank S. Dickson,
was formulating for the mobilization of the military forces of
the state. As a result of the Mexican border troubles of 1916
the national guard of Illinois, the first state to have her troops
mobilized for this service, was in better condition than it had
been at any time since the Spanish-American War. The Fourth
regiment was still in Texas, the Third regiment had just re-
turned to Fort Sheridan, while the other commands were fairly
well equipped and ready for mobilization. Volunteer drill
companies were formed at different points, the first one at
Peoria sponsored by the Peoria Board of Trade, but the state
administration made it clear that it considered conscription
necessary for the national defense. Governor Lowden and a
large number of Illinois political leaders organized a cam-
paign in favor of universal military training as the only demo-
cratic method of national defense; certain patriotic and civic
organizations of Chicago arranged a gigantic parade and mass
meeting at that city on March 31 to create sentiment in favor
of universal service. Three days before, in spite of influences
at work to obstruct legislative action, the state senate had
unanimously adopted a resolution for compulsory military
training and on April 4 the house concurred in its adoption. 13
At this juncture Illinois representatives at Washington
were called upon to voice the decision of their state on the
12 Illinois State Journal, February 9, 1917.
13 Chicago Tribune, March 27, 1917; Illinois State Journal, March 28, April
i, 1917; House Journal, 1917, p. 507; La<ws of 1917, p. 810 ff.
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 459
momentous issue of peace or war. Inasmuch as the nation
seemed on the brink of the international precipice, the ques-
tion was raised by Frank Buchanan of Chicago and others as
to whether or not there should be a war declaration without
a referendum vote. But the real question at issue could not
be brought to a settlement on account of the expiration of the
sixty-fourth congress on March 3, just when international
problems were reaching a crisis.
President Wilson therefore called a special session of con-
gress to meet on April 2. The minds of the legislators were
already made up when they gathered at Washington and
listened to the war recommendation of the president; but a
few days were spent in a verbal reviewing of the situation.
A small but active group which was determined to defeat the
war resolution had for its spokesman in the house Repre-
sentative Fred A. Britten of Chicago. He declared that an
overwhelming majority of the people of the country were
opposed to war and offered an amendment that only those
forces that specifically volunteered for foreign service should
do land duty outside the United States. This resolution be-
came the subject of the last extended debate in the hour before
the war resolution passed. Congressman-at-large William E.
Mason also explained his opposition to a declaration of war. 14
When the vote was taken the names of five Illinoisians were
found among the fifty who voted in the negative. 15
In spite of the belief of many that American troops would
never fight on the soil of Europe, the war resolution meant a
call of the nation to arms. The local organizations of the
national guard were the first contribution made by Illinois to
14 In the course of the debate, Representative James R. Mann, who, as
republican floor leader, was one of the active exponents of the resolution, paid
" a tribute to the courage of those members of the House who in the exercise
of the responsibility cast upon them have had the courage to express their
opposition to the pending resolution I do not agree with them, but this is a
time when members of this body, aye, all the citizens of the country, have the
right to express their opposition to the war, for to-morrow, when war is declared,
it will become the duty of all citizens to uphold the honor and the power of
the Republic." Congressional Record) April 5, 1917, p. 219.
15 Ibid., 243 ff. These were Britten (Chicago), Fuller (Belvidere), Mason
(Chicago), Rodenburg (East St. Louis), and Loren E. Wheeler (Springfield).
460 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
the great American army that was put into the field. Even
prior to the declaration of war certain units were called by
the president into the federal service to guard important trans-
portation ways, munitions depots, and arsenals in Illinois and
adjacent states. By August 5, 1917, all the organizations of
the Illinois national guard had been mustered into federal serv-
ice. Included were a regiment of field artillery, a regiment
of engineers, and two field hospital units and four ambulance
companies organized subsequent to June 30, 1918. The total,
a contribution of 25,045 officers and men, mobilized by the
federal government .at Camp Logan, Texas, was formed
almost as a body into the Thirty-third division and was placed
under the command of Major General George Bell, Jr. At
the same time the naval battalion of Illinois with its 40 officers
and 814 enlisted men was called into federal service.
With the regular units preparing for over-sea duty the
state administration undertook to create three infantry regi-
ments for service within the state. These were recruited and
mustered in during June and July, 1917, placed under the com-
mand of Brigadier General Frank S. Dickson, the adjutant
general, and brought into state camp at Springfield for a pro-
longed period of special training. "Illinois led every other
state in the Union in organizing, equipping and training a mil-
itary force for service within her borders." 16 In addition
volunteer training units were organized by the state council
of defense; by an act of June 25, 1917, provision was also
made for the organization of a reserve militia of volunteers
from the unorganized militia of the state. Under this act
Governor Lowden called for six thousand volunteers on Sep-
tember 19, 1917, and eleven thousand additional volunteers on
March 4, 1918. As a result eight regiments, one separate
battalion, and thirty-eight separate companies of reserve militia
were mustered in. All these organizations gave valuable train-
ing to hundreds of men who were later inducted into federal
service under the selective service act. This left in the muster
16 Report of the Adjutant General, July I, 79/7, to June 30, 1918.
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 461
rolls numerous gaps that were filled only by the most aggres-
sive recruiting activities.
The outbreak of war, however, brought little enthusiasm
for volunteer enlistment in the United States army. Instead
of a rush for the recruiting stations, there was a rush for the
marriage license bureau; many, too, sought out the bookstores
to secure, equipment for the benefits of the vicarious library
table training camp. 17 On April 12, recruiting officers sta-
tioned at the gates of the Cub ball park at Chicago failed to
secure a single recruit out of the eighteen thousand solicited. 18
Yet at the close of the first twenty days of April, Illinois with
2,427 was reported to have led all states in regular army
recruiting.
It was quite evident that those numbers were inadequate
to the nation's needs in the international crisis. For this rea-
son the idea of conscription under a selective draft law gained
headway. This resulted in the selective service law of May
1 8, 1917. On the fifth of June, 651,164 Illinoisians between
the ages of 21 and 31 were registered; under later registra-
tions 1,572,747 between the ages of 18 and 45 were enrolled.
Inductions under the law drew on 188,010 citizens, bringing
the total number of men furnished to the land forces by the
state to 322,812. In addition, up to June 30, 1918, Illinois
furnished naval forces to the number of 28,341. The grand
total contributed by the state was, therefore, over 35M53- 19
In the training of the fighting forces of the country Illinois
played a very important part. Camp Grant was established
at Rockford as a cantonment to train a part of the national
army. A series of officers' training camps at Fort Sheridan
contributed a large share of the officers who organized the
vast American army. The Great Lakes naval training station
17 Chicago Tribune, April 10, n, 12, etc., 1917. On April 9 in Chicago alone,
where the recruiting offices secured but a small number of recruits, 1,126 mar-
riage licenses were issued.
18 Illinois State Journal, April 13, 1917.
19 Statistics from report of Major Edgar B. Tolman to Adjutant General
Frank S. Dickson for 1918; Second Report of the Provost Marshal General to the
Secretary of War on the Selective Service System, p. 458 ff., 468 ff.
462 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
was the training school for recruits from the central west to
the naval forces of the United States. A school of military
aeronautics connected with the University of Illinois provided
many of Uncle Sam's aviators with their preliminary theo-
retical preparation; Chanute field at Rantoul and Scott field at
Belleville completed the conversion of these recruits into full-
fledged flyers.
Soon Illinois was seething with every kind of war activity.
The business man exchanged his desk for one in a government
office, the artisan went into a war supplies plant, the farmer
accepted the self-imposed discipline of a vast land army; while
the physician and the dentist left their practices for the medical
corps, the engineer placed his specialized training at the service
of the military arm of the nation, and the reserve man power
of the state found places in the complex machinery of the civil-
ian organizations handling war and relief work. It was
obvious from the start that the war furnished more than a
simple military problem.
The implications of the principle of universal service soon
became evident to that portion of the citizenry of Illinois that
escaped the call to arms. As a result almost the entire pop-
ulation of the state was conscripted to take some active part
in the struggle. This noncombatant service was in some in-
stances official, in other cases quasi-official, and sometimes had
no other foundation than the enthusiastic desire of those who
were forced to stay at home to do their bit in their own way.
Within a month after the outbreak of the war, Hinton G.
Clabaugh, superintendent of the federal bureau of investigation
at Chicago, reported "about one million" offers to work for
his branch of the government without pay. 20 It was in this
20 Chicago Tribune, May 5, 1917. Within three months the "American
Protective League," a volunteer secret service organization originated in Chi-
cago and soon had the wealth and brains of Chicago and the country behind it.
" Its scope covers every city, town, and hamlet in every section of the United
States. It has a membership of 200,000 with a million intelligence agents or
operatives active in the field of service. Bank presidents, railroad heads,
judges, lawyers, and other captains of industry are zealous workers in this
national army of detectives. ... Its achievements in Chicago alone may be
summarized in this way: In the short period of organization 3,000 persons
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 463
spirit that the state council of defense was organized, that the
machinery of the Red Cross was extended, that Liberty loan
drives were engineered, and that innumerable special war work
campaign committees were created overnight to take their
parts in the vast system of civilian service.
The official clearing house for all these agencies was the
state council of defense of Illinois. Created by an act of
the general assembly approved on May 2, 1917, it was part
of a general machinery of organization under which the nation
at large was shifted to a war footing. The council consisted of
fifteen persons experts on matters pertaining to national or
state defense appointed by the governor to serve without pay.
It cooperated officially with the different officers, departments,
institutions, and agencies of the state and with local and munici-
pal officers, and maintained close and friendly relations with
all organizations engaged in relief or war work. 21
There was a dramatic scene when, at the summons of
Governor Lowden, the members of the council came together
for the first time. Samuel Insull, the public utilities magnate
of Chicago, and J. Ogden Armour, the well-known packer, two
giants in the world of capital, doubtless received a tremendous
shock when they faced as their associates in the council John
Walker and Victor Olander, president and secretary respec-
tively of the Illinois Federation of Labor. Here were the
opposite poles of the industrial world, men who as traditional
opponents had learned to fear, if not to hate, each other for
the very power which they had come to wield. The governor
saw the issue and rose directly to meet it; in well-chosen words
have been investigated. This covered every known form of federal disloyalty,
including slackers. Nearly 5,000 agents are at the constant command for
movement of troops from Chicago territory. Day and night twenty-five auto-
mobiles are kept in close proximity of the federal building for emergency use."
Clipping from Chicago newspaper, August 25, 1917.
21 See State Council of Defense of Illinois, Information Documents, especially
number 5, " The State Council of Defense of Illinois; what it is and what it does."
The membership of the state council of defense, as constituted by Governor
Lowden, was as follows: Samuel Insull, chairman, J. Ogden Armour, Dr. Frank
Billings, Mrs. Joseph T. Bowen. B. F. Harris, John H. Harrison, John P.
Hopkins, Levy Mayer, John G. Oglesby, V. A. Olander, David E. Shanahan, John
A. Spoor, Fred W. Upham, Charles H. Wacker, and John H. Walker.
464 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
he pointed out their community of interest: "This war can
be won by neither labor nor capital, alone. Gentlemen, you
have got to work together 1 " And then the compact was
sealed. Perhaps no other single episode so well explains the
part which Illinois came to play in the world war.
From its headquarters in Chicago this state council of
defense directed all war activities in the state. It functioned
through eleven standing committees on auditing, coordination
of societies, food production and conservation, industrial sur-
vey, labor, law and legislation, military affairs, publicity, sani-
tation and public health, survey of man power, and women's
organizations, and a special committee on conservation of
financial resources. In order to cooperate with neighboring
states it organized a conference of the councils of defense of
thirteen Mississippi valley states, with Samuel Insull as chair-
man. It also organized twenty-one classes of subordinate
bodies which supervised developments in the counties and in the
local communities of the state. In less than a year the council
was able through these subordinate bodies to marshal an army
of over fifty thousand active war aides working directly under
the council and accepting its instructions virtually as orders.
The state council of defense maintained close and friendly
relations with all official, quasi-official, and philanthropic or-
ganizations engaged in war and relief work in Illinois. The
American Red Cross was actively in the field from the outset
and developed increasing efficiency. The army Y. M. C. A.
and the Knights of Columbus maintained reading, writing, and
recreation rooms at army, navy, and aviation camps, canton-
ments, and stations. The " Four-Minute Men," 22 the Liberty
loan campaign committees and directors, the American Pro-
tective League, and the National Security League, as a result
22 The "Four-Minute Men" movement was originated in Chicago in March,
1917; on April 28, it was incorporated under a state charter and soon after
became a national organization. Illinois, the birthplace of this organization,
probably carried its activities farther than did other states. At the close of
its work there were in Illinois 2,800 regular "Four-Minute Men" speakers, 994
speakers in the fraternal section, 1,195 speakers in the church section, and 68
in the labor union section, making a total of 5,057 speakers. " The audiences
numbered 800,000 people per week."
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 465
of their common cooperation with the state council of defense,
carried on their respective lines of activity with little unneces-
sary duplication.
For Illinois, as well as for the nation, one of the most
difficult tasks was that of adequate production and satisfactory
distribution of food products. The Mississippi valley was the
granary of the continent; Illinois, the greatest of all food pro-
ducing states, was its center; and Chicago was the great market
and distributing point for the food supplies of the nation.
With food riots not only in hungry Europe and in congested
New York but even in Chicago, Illinois agriculturalists were
ready to pronounce food America's greatest possible contribu-
tion to the war. "Food will win the war!" was one of the
first war slogans sent out from Washington. Under its com-
pelling appeal the state council of defense and the Illinois
branch of the federal food administration grappled earnestly
with a problem which made heavy demands upon the industry
of the farmer, the conscientiousness of the middleman, and
the zeal and enterprise of the housewife. Inasmuch as a farm
labor shortage already existed throughout the west, making
impossible the maximum planting and harvesting of food-
stuffs to ward off the threatened world famine, a call was sent
out for recruits to the land army. 23 Farm labor recruiting
stations were set up in newspaper offices and in public and
quasi-public buildings. Appeals were made to men unfit for
active service and to boys over fourteen. Though both groups
made some response to the appeal, it was soon evident that
plans for the organization of a civil-military service for war
work were too complicated to meet the immediate need. It
was not long, therefore, before deferred classification was
given to prospective draft men engaged in agricultural work.
In a very short period of time an efficient organization
23 In the early days of the struggle, after Governor Lowden had issued a
proclamation asking the state to mobilize its forces for increasing production of
food, the battle-cry " Farm and Army" was raised by Theodore Roosevelt in a
stirring speech at Chicago and taken up throughout the country. Illinois State
Journal, April 16, 29, 1917.
4 66 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
of the school boys of the state was developed through the
United States Boys' Working Reserve. Burridge D. Butler,
who was appointed federal-state director for Illinois, worked
in close coordination with the council of defense; cooperation
was also secured with the schools, colleges, and other organi-
zations. For Illinois a plan was adopted whereby an elemen-
tary agricultural course was offered in over seven hundred
high schools ; over 15,000 boys studied this course. The school
year was revised to meet the demand, and school credits were
given for farm work. As a result 45,000 boys were enrolled
in the reserve and 21,000 were placed on farms; crops
worth $23,000,000 were raised and the boys' earnings
totaled $1,200,000. Here was an experience that taught
constructively the lesson of patriotism and the obligations of
citizenship. 24
American participation in the war brought about spec-
tacular increases in the prices of all staple food supplies. In
a period of six weeks the price of flour nearly doubled. On
May 12, 1917, the Illinois state council of defense went on
record in favor of federal price regulation of coal, food, and
other basic commodities. Federal agents had already begun to
study operations in the trading pit of the Chicago Board of
Trade, but on May n the directors of that institution took
action to prevent speculation. It was quite obvious, however,
that business men had not yet fully adjusted themselves to the
grim facts of war. On May 15, J. Ogden Armour, meat
packer, member of the Illinois state council of defense and of
the advisory committee of the council for national defense,
declared that a " business-as-usual " program would guarantee
the continuation of the prosperity of the country in spite of
the war. 25 The federal government soon felt it necessary to
inaugurate a general food investigation in Chicago to discover
why, with storage houses packed to their capacity, "bursting
24 Annual report of the United States Boys' Working Reserve in Illinois, July
i, 1917, to July 15, 1918.
^Illinois State Journal, May 16, 1917.
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT: WAR 467
with food," prices were steadily soaring. Indictments were
soon returned and prosecution was begun against a group of
individuals and firms dealing in butter and eggs. It became
evident that drastic food control was necessary and a federal
war food bill became a law on August 10, 1917.
The Illinois division of the United States food administra-
tion was created informally in July, 1917, under the authority
of the president, to develop emergency departments to. care
for the war situation. Even in advance of the law of August
10, 1917, which clarified the situation, Harry A. Wheeler and
Robert Stevenson, Jr., his assistant, were organizing the work
in Illinois, making a thorough survey of the situation, and pre-
paring a campaign for a twenty-five per cent increase in the
wheat crop of Illinois. Mr. Wheeler was the first federal food
administrator appointed under the act of August 10.
The state was promptly divided into fifteen districts, each
in charge of a Chicago business man who completed the county
and local organizations and who held daily conferences with
his associates at the Chicago headquarters. A food conser-
vation campaign inaugurated late in 1917 resulted in the sig-
nature of pledge cards by 850,000 families, or about sixty per
cent of the total in the state. A number of regulatory features
were inaugurated; a committee created to interpret retail food
prices undertook to prepare and publish the fair wholesale
prices of food commodities and fair minimum as well as fair
maximum charges to the consumer. This plan was an Illi-
nois contribution and was later adopted by the federal food
administrator for use throughout the country. Illinois was
the first state to appreciate the necessity of conserving the sugar
supply through more uniform distribution. The machinery
devised by the Illinois division prepared the way for the com-
pulsory regulation of both wholesale and retail distribution
that became necessary in May and June, 1918. In a similar
manner, through cooperation with the trade, the allotment of
wheat flour to manufacturers and distributors, its conservation
by bakers, food conservation in hotels and restaurants, and the
468 THE MODERN COMMONWEALTH
establishment of fair prices for milk and ice were accomplished.
To reenforce and supplement the publicity work undertaken
by the division, a department of investigation and enforcement
was created in 1918 to summon violators of the regulations and
to hold hearings. About three thousand cases, many of which
were the result of ignorance, were reviewed; deliberate evaders
were referred to the legal department of the government. In
the main, however, the work of the food administration was
effective because of the cooperation of the various forces
involved. 26
The coal problem of Illinois was first supervised by the
Illinois state council of defense, which inaugurated a campaign
for increased production and more adequate distribution. In
July, 1917, the problem of price control became serious enough
to lead to a conference between the secretary of the interior,
Franklin K. Lane, and a special committee of seven operators
from Illinois, in which a maximum price was agreed upon.
Evidences of unpatriotic profiteering, however, aroused
both the governor and the Illinois state council of defense,
which, in a meeting on July 17, agreed that the situation might
require a drastic regulatory policy. The state council sum-
moned representative coal operators to a conference in which
fair prices for coal were announced; but the operators
appealed to Washington for federal intervention in their
behalf. 27 They hoped to get from Secretary Lane a decla-
ration supporting a schedule of reduced prices recently made
effective by the Peabody Company. 28 The governor was able,
on August 10, however, to effect with a committee of coal oper-
ators an arrangement by which Chief Justice O. N. Carter of
the supreme court of Illinois became director of coal; with
28 This is the conclusion of Robert Stevenson, Jr., deputy food administrator,
and in active charge during 1918.
27 Illinois State Journal, July 28, 1917. In August, Governor Lowden and
Governor J. P. Goodrich of Indiana conferred over the coal situation and the
possibilities of compelling coal operators to reduce prices.
28 T ne chairman of the Coal Production committee of the National Council
of Defense was Mr. Francis S. Peabody, by all odds the largest coal operator in
Illinois. It was, therefore, easy for Mr. Peabody to agree upon the price of coal
in Illinois with the operators of Illinois." Illinois State Journal, August 21, 19x7.
ILLINOIS AND THE GREAT WAR 469
the aid and advice of a permanent committee composed of
three members of the state council of defense, three represent-
atives of the Illinois Coal Operators' Associa 
