Edward Douglass White

“ The court then came to consider the correctness of the principle applied by the Rhode Island courts, in the light of § 4 of article 4 of the Constitution of the United States. The contention of the plaintiff in error concerning that article was, in substantial effect, thus pressed in argument: The ultimate power of sovereignty is in the people; and they, in the nature of things, if the government is a free one, must have a right to change their Constitution. Where, in the ordinary course, no other means exists of doing so, that right, of necessity, embraces the power to resort to revolution. ”

“ In other words, do they authorize the judiciary to substitute its judgment as to a matter purely political for the judgment of Congress on a subject committed to it, and thus overthrow the Constitution upon the ground that thereby the guaranty to the states of a government republican in form may be secured,-a conception which, after all, rests upon the assumption that the states are to be guaranteed a government republican in form by destroying the very existence of a government republican in form in the nation. ”

“ To make the physical power of the United States available, at the demand of an existing state government, to suppress all resistance to its authority, and yet to afford no method of testing the rightful character of the state government, would be to render people of a particular state hopeless in case of a wrongful government. ”

“ 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. ”

“ This being so, the contention, if held to be sound, would necessarily affect the validity, not only of the particular statute which is before us, but of every other statute passed in Oregon since the adoption of the initiative and referendum. And indeed, the propositions go further than this, since in their essence they assert that there is no governmental function, legislative or judicial, in Oregon, because it cannot be assumed, if the proposition be well founded, that there is, at one and the same time, one and the same government, which is republican in form, and not of that character. ”

“ It was pointed out in the argument that the decision of the courts of Rhode Island in favor of the charter government illustrated the force of these contentions, since they proceeded solely on the established character of that government, and not upon whether the people had rightfully overthrown it by voluntarily drawing and submitting for approval a new Constitution. It is thus seen that the propositions relied upon in this case were presented for decision in the most complete and most direct way. ”

“ The first power reserved by the people is the initiative, and not more than 8 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. ”

“ In view of the importance of the subject, the apparent misapprehension on one side and seeming misconception on the other, suggested by the argument as to the full significance of the previous doctrine, we do not content ourselves with a mere citation of the cases, but state more at length than we otherwise would the issues and the doctrine expounded in the leading and absolutely controlling case,-Luther v. ”