Switzerland is the home of the referendum. It is commonly believed that that republic has existed for six hundred years. The fact, however, is that it is the youngest of republics. The characteristic features of the government, those which make it a republic in fact as well as in name, were instituted by the present generation. It is the only country in the world to-day which has overthrown its plutocracy and which has made it impossible for corrupt politicians to rule the people through the representative system. To the principle of direct legislation, as carried out by the initiative and referendum must be ascribed the happy conditions which surround its politics. Mr. W. D. McCrackan, author of “The Rise of the Swiss Republic,” who has made a special study of the subject, has published in the _Arena_ his observations of Swiss politics. He finds that, as a result of the referendum, jobbery and extravagance are unknown, and that politics, as there is no money in it, has ceased to be a trade. Officeholders are taken from the ranks of citizenship and are invariably chosen because of their fitness for the work. The people take an intelligent interest in the legislation, local and federal, and are fully imbued with a sense of their political responsibilities. The _Westminster Review_, speaking of the referendum, expresses this opinion: “The bulk of the people move more slowly than their representatives, are more cautious in adopting new and trying legislative experiments and have a tendency to reject propositions submitted to them for the first time.... The issue which is presented to the sovereign people is invariably and necessarily reduced to its simplest expression and so placed before them as to be capable of an affirmative or negative answer. In practice, therefore, the discussion of details is left to the representative assemblies, while the public express approval or disapproval of the general principle or policy embraced in the proposed measure. Public attention being confined to the issue, leaders are nothing. Collective wisdom judges of merits.” In some of the cantons of Switzerland the referendum has been in practice since the sixteenth century. As it is now employed it was adopted by the canton of St. Gallen in 1830, and in 1848 it was incorporated in the Swiss federal constitution. It has been so extended since then that it is now in operation in all the Swiss cantons except Freiburg. According to the Swiss constitution all amendments thereto must be ratified by the Swiss electors before they become effective. Other measures, like ordinary enactments, must be submitted to a popular vote if a demand is made for such submission, written ninety days after their publication. This demand must be made by 30,000 voters or by the government of eight of the nineteen entire and six half cantons. In Switzerland the referendum has proved to be entirely satisfactory as a check upon hasty or class legislation.