The legislature of 1899 passed a law providing for “primary elections” to replace nominations by party caucuses and conventions. The act is not operative in towns, villages, and small cities, and does not apply to state officers. The primary election takes place on the first of the registration days for the usual election, and is conducted by the same judges and clerks. Any person eligible to an office may, by payment of a prescribed fee and making a qualifying oath, have his name printed on the primary ballot of his party. Every qualified voter may, after registration, receive and mark the ballot of the party he “generally supported at the last election and intends to support at the next ensuing.” The general election laws apply, and the usual penalties attach to misconduct. The experiment is still too brief to warrant a final judgment. It has certainly weakened the machine, and stimulated aspiration to office in persons whose qualifications are more apparent to themselves than to others. That candidates for judicial positions are obliged to make a personal canvass is perhaps the feature most to be regretted. When the capitol building was burned in 1881 the legislature, upon Governor Pillsbury’s recommendation, immediately appropriated $75,000 for rebuilding, on the assumption that the walls were sufficiently sound. This assumption was found mistaken, and additional sums were voted till more than four times the original amount was expended. But ten years had not passed before it was apparent that ampler accommodations were imperative for multiplying functionaries and expanding business. The legislature of 1893 accordingly authorized the appointment of a commission to plan, build, and furnish a new and appropriate structure. The local influence was sufficiently effective to keep the location in the heart of St. Paul, on an elevated site of small area, rather than permit erection on a larger area in the “midway district,” still in that city, but near Minneapolis. The corner-stone was laid on July 27, 1898, by Alexander Ramsey. Senator C. K. Davis delivered the principal address. The legislature of 1905 was the first to convene in the completed building. The traditional plan of a central body flanked by wings and surmounted by a dome was followed, with the variation that the house of representatives is housed in a rear extension, leaving the wings to accommodate the senate and the supreme court. The exterior is of Georgia marble. The interior corridors are faced with polished Minnesota magnesian limestones of charming tints, relieved by panels of foreign marbles. The interior of the dome, the senate chamber, the supreme court room, and the governor’s office are splendidly decorated with mural paintings by leading American artists. Over the façade of the central structure rests a quadriga in bronze, typifying the progress of Minnesota. The total cost was $4,428,539.72; and in this age the honorable commissioners need not resent as