While the retirement of all the Senators who do not hold over would strengthen the reform element in the Senate, nevertheless the State can ill afford to lose the services of the seven who stood out so valiantly against machine policies. Senator Bell heads the list, with Caminetti, Black, Boynton and Sanford close seconds. Senator Bell not only made the best record made in the Senate of 1909, but he made the best record of the Senate of 1907. Conscientious, fully awake to the responsibilities of his position, alive to the tricks of the machine leaders, in constant attendance, Senator Bell proved himself during the two sessions that he has served in the Senate, a power for good government. His absence from the session of 1911 would be a loss to the State. Senators Black and Boynton at the session of 1909 made records quite as good as that made by Senator Bell. On the sixteen roll calls taken as tests of the standing of the several Senators, Black voted but once against reform policies. On the first ballot on the Party Circle bill he voted against the measure, but the day following, corrected his mistake by voting for the measure. Boynton voted to return the Local Option bill to the Judiciary Committee, but at the final test his vote was recorded for the bill[103a]. Thus neither of the two Senators can be said to have voted with the machine even on comparatively unimportant issues. Senator Caminetti probably gave the machine more worry during the session than any other one Senator. Caminetti has, a way of saying out loud what his anti-machine associates are thinking, which is not at all popular with the machine. True to principle, he, a Democrat, voted for United States Senator Perkins because, from Caminetti's view-point, no other candidate came so near to being the popular choice of the people as Perkins, and Caminetti holds that the people and not the Legislature should select the United States Senator. The machine was glad of Caminetti's vote for Perkins, but was not at all pleased with the departure of a Democrat voting for a Republican. Caminetti's course continued in by all the members of the Legislature, and the machine would lose its monopoly of Federal Senator-making.