Page:The Wisconsin idea (IA cu31924032449252).pdf/56

 usual in the legislative body to hear Norwegians, Danes or Swedes quote in debate the high standards maintained in Norway or in the Scandinavian countries. Men familiar with foreign agricultural methods and those trained in the people's high schools of Denmark or in the scientific schools of Sweden or Norway are helping to organize county agricultural schools. Behind this Wisconsin movement is a great body of tradition, a tradition of orderliness and of scientific methods, a knowledge that things can and should be done by experts in a careful and diligent manner and that progress must come, slowly but thoroughly.

If we are going to understand Wisconsin legislation, we must fully realize that the leaders of it could not be agitators of the type which is seen frequently in other parts of the country. However radical their ideas may have been, however original their methods, it was inevitable that legislation should be constructed slowly and cautiously. The men who have had the greatest influence in making that legislation what it is, were inspired by these ideals. The people of Wisconsin would not have supported any wild or extravagant legislative schemes. The stock is too sturdy, too cautious and too conservative to be swayed by any revolutionary influence. The leaders had a stubborn, determined people with whom to deal. They were slow to move, as they are to-day, and it took long patience and fighting to win them, but once moved, they "stayed put."