1 &&'0M
52
THE RECALL OF PUBLIC OFFICERS
;
tentative to its adoption.2s Woodrow Wilson, interviewed on the train a few weeks later, before he was
fairly within the state, expressed his surprise at the importance attached to the issue and spoke somewhat less
favorably of the idea. In his estimation the recall was
not the remedy for a bad judiciary. The reform must
come at the other end of the system and could be accomplished by the direct primary and honest elections. "The
recall can secure immediate results on a bad judge, but I
fear in getting quick results the fundamental good of a
true judiciary would be sacrificed. The judiciary must
have stability and this the recall might endanger." 29
The intensive campaign for the adoption of the amendments opened the latter part of August. Champions for
and against ratification held debates before civic leagues;
newspapers devoted vast amounts of space to explanation
of the various provisions and in their editorial columns
supported or denounced them violently; orators, such as
Senator Moses E. Clapp of Minnesota and W. S. U'Ren,
father of direct legislation in Oregon, were imported from
other states to address mass meetings; and Governor
Johnson, with Dr. John R. Haynes, Francis J. Heney and
others, stumped the state in automobiles from Siskiyou
to the Mexican border advocating passage of the progressive measures.
The recall came in for more than its share of attention.
All the standard arguments on both sides were once more
set forth in the form supposed to be most alluring to the
average voter. The shades of all the great legal commentators. Constitutional Fathers and interpreters of
American ideals were invoked to prove the impracticability of pure democracy and the need for an independent
judiciary, or the contrary; and echoes of all the orthodox
bombast about "special privilege,"  "private  interests,"
88 Los Angeles Record, March 23. 1911.
"Ibid., May 12, 1911.
ADOPTION OF  THE RECALL IN CALIFORNIA    53
"the tyranny of the majority" and "destruction of our
representative form of government" reverberated from
.one border of the state to the other. Advertisements
urging the people to "Vote Against the Recall Amendment" because, "if this amendment is adopted only dema-
■gogues will run for office, and to hold the public sentiment
or clamor in their favor, judges and all officeholders will
violate the oath of office in trying to serve two masters,
God and the Mob," appeared beside appeals to "Vote for
the Recall Amendment, it gives the people power to
discharge dishonest officials."
The situation afforded unlimited range for Governor
Johnson's rare talent for vituperation and for the ponderous satire of his pet aversion, the Los Angeles Times,
which neither of them in any way neglected. Johnson
fulminated against President Taft for violating the
political liberty of Arizona by denying them the recall
of judges, and demolished the anti-recall arguments of
the enemy with adroit phrases that both convinced and
entertained the huge crowds that flocked to hear him.
If it was suggested that the recall would intimidate the
austere judiciary, Johnson would thunder, "Cowards!
My friends, you can't make a coward of a man by holding
a pistol at his head; you can only demonstrate whether
he is one." And in reply to the argument that judges
subject to the recall "would keep their ears to the ground"
from obsequious regard for the public's latest whim,
Johnson would thrust back, to the delight of his listeners,
"We would rather that the judges kept their ears to the
ground than to the railroad tracks in California."
For the time, at least, the state seemed to have gone
overwhelmingly progressive. Governor Johnson and his
followers had captured the popular ear and the conservative forces were unable to meet his stirring challenge.
Even the Times seemed to have lost its gift of personal
invective, and its final editorial appeal on the morning
m
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