THE POLL - OF - THE - PEOPLE BILL. [To TEEN EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR. " ] SIR, —In
his speech introducing this Bill, Lord Balfour of Burleigh is reported as saying "in certain of the States of America the Referendum was resorted to;" and the Earl of Crewe, in the debate which followed, is reported to have said, "In many States in America for the purpose of altering the Constitution the Referendum is used." Let there be no mistake in regard to the American practice. In every State changes in the Constitution (and there have been very many of them) have always been effected by a poll of the people : no Constitution of any of the 46 States was adopted without a poll of the people, and not one has been changed without it. In Rhode Island (the State which Mr. Bryce says " best deserves to have its annals treated of by a philosophic historian ") there have been at least nine (I think, ten) amendments to its Constitution, all of which re- ceived a three-fifths majority at a poll of the people. Its Supreme Court has said that the Constitution can be changed in no other way. And, in addition to taking a poll of the people upon proposed changes in the Constitution, in many States there are Constitutional requirements that the people shall be consulted by taking a poll upon other measures. For instance, in Rhode Island, " the General Assembly," which is the name of the Parliament, "shall have no power without the express consent of the people to incur State debts to an amount exceeding 50,000 dole."
"Express consent of the people " has been obtained only by
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