Page:Address of Frederick V. Holman at Oregon Bar Association annual meeting.djvu/43

 I have endeavored, in this address, to show the danger and impracticability of the people making radical changes in a State Constitution without considering, and in contravention of the history, the principles, and the fundamental law of a republican form of government and in opposition to the traditions and to the genius of our institutions.

Section 1 of Article IV, as amended, of Oregon Constitution is as follows:

"§ 1. The legislative authority of the State shall be vested in a Legislative Assembly, consisting of a Senate and House of Representatives, but the people reserve to themselves power to propose laws and amendments to the Constitution and to enact or reject the same at the polls, independent of the Legislative Assembly, and also reserve power at their own option to approve or reject at the polls any act of the Legislative Assembly. The first power reserved by the people is the initiative, and not more than eight per cent of the legal voters shall be required to propose any measure by such petition, and every such petition shall include the full text of the measure so proposed. Initiative petitions shall be filed with the Secretary of State not less than four months before the election at which they are to be voted upon. The second power is the referendum, and it may be ordered (except as to laws necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety), either by the petition signed by five per cent of the legal voters, or by the Legislative Assembly, as other bills are enacted. Referendum petitions shall be filed with the Secretary of State not more than ninety days after the final adjournment of the session of the Legislative Assembly which passed the bill on which the referendum is demanded. The veto power of the Governor shall not extend to measures referred to the people. All elections on measures referred to the people of the State shall be had at the biennial regular general elections, except when the Legislative Assembly shall order a special election. Any measure referred to the people shall take effect and become the law when it is approved by a majority of the votes cast thereon, and not otherwise. The style of all bills shall be: 'Be it enacted by the people of the State of Oregon.This section shall not be construed to deprive any member of the Legislative Assembly of the right to introduce any measure. The whole number of votes cast for Justice of the Supreme Court at the regular election last preceding the filing of any petition for the initiative or for the referendum shall be the basis on which the number of legal voters necessary to sign such petition shall be counted. Petitions and orders for the initiative and for the referendum shall be filed with the Secretary of State, and in submitting the same to the people he, and all other officers, shall be guided by the general laws and the act submitting this amendment, until legislation shall be especially provided therefor."