Few are aware of the advances which direct legislation has made in state government in the United States. Many facts on this subject, collected by Mr. Ellis P. Oberholtzer, were published in the "Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science," November, 1891. Condensed, this writer's statement is as follows: Constitutional amendments now go to the people for a vote in every state except Delaware. The significance of this fact, and the resemblance of this vote to the Swiss Referendum, are seen when one considers the subject matter of a state constitution. Nowadays, such a constitution usually limits a legislature to a short biennial session and defines in detail what laws the legislature may and may not pass. In fact, then, in adopting a constitution once in ten or twenty years, the voters of a state decide upon admissible legislation. Thus they themselves are the real legislators. Among the matters once left entirely to legislatures, but now commonly dealt with in constitutions, are the following: Prohibiting or regulating the liquor traffic; prohibiting or chartering lotteries; determining tax rates; founding and locating state schools and other state institutions; establishing a legal rate of interest; fixing the salaries of public officials; drawing up railroad and other corporation regulations; and defining the relations of husbands and wives, and of debtors and creditors. In line with all this is a tendency to easy amendment. In nearly all the new states and in those older ones which have recently revised their constitutions, the time in which amendments may be effected is as a rule but half of that formerly required. Where once the approval of two successive legislatures was exacted, now the consent of one is considered sufficient. In fifteen states, until submitted to a popular vote, no law changing the location of the capital is valid; in seven, no laws establishing banking corporations; in eleven, no laws for the incurrence of debts excepting such as are specified in the constitution, and no excess of "casual deficits" beyond a stipulated sum; in several, no rate of assessment exceeding a figure proportionate to the aggregate valuation of the taxable property. Without the Referendum, Illinois cannot sell its state canal; Minnesota cannot pay interest or principal of the Minnesota railroad; North Carolina cannot extend the state credit to aid any person or corporation, excepting to help certain railroads unfinished in 1876. With the Referendum, Colorado may adopt woman suffrage and create a debt for public buildings; Texas may fix a location for a college for colored youth; Wyoming may decide on the sites for its state university, insane asylum and penitentiary.