Governor Altgeld of Illinois had become widely and unfavorably known as “the governor who pardoned the Haymarket rioters” after they had been tried and condemned as bomb throwers. Such was his reputation for a long time, during which he remained silent. Then an unbiased study of his career brought about a reversal of public opinion. It was presented that he was wholly unselfish; that his life motive had been to help the underprivileged; that, in the words of the poet Vachel Lindsay, “He set himself tasks which took a lion’s courage and a martyr’s heart,” and that to carry out his purpose “He threw his reputation and his health into the furnace every hour.” So it happened in 1913, eleven years after Altgeld’s death, the Illinois legislature appropriated $25,000 for an Altgeld monument. A committee of five was appointed, including Louis F. Post of the Department of Labor, with instructions to select a sculptor after a public competition. Two competitions were held, bringing over thirty models, none satisfactory. In a letter to the committee the landscape artist, Walter B. Griffin, wrote: This particular task should be committed to a sculptor who has attained in his art that fundamental character, the American ideal, which Altgeld served in his own field and exemplified in his career. There appears to be in our time at least one sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, who is recognized as bearing to the plastic arts a relation like Whitman’s to literature. It would be a pity not to avail ourselves of the opportunity to bring together such a man and the work he is so eminently fitted for. Following this suggestion the committee awarded the commission to Gutzon, who received it with intense satisfaction as a recognition of what he stood for in public life as well as a testimonial to his ability as an artist. When the news came out the Chicago _Tribune_ published this comment: A powerful illustration of how not to do it is the history of the competition for the Altgeld monument. The commission has now been awarded to Gutzon Borglum without his being required to furnish any preliminary sketch, design or idea. That is, the committee has done what it should have done in the first place--selected a sculptor and left him free to do the work. General competitions are so unjust to the competitors and so unproductive of good results as to be forbidden by the American Institute of Architects. The best architects never enter them, and the better sculptors have learned to follow their example.