7 the State Governments

The proposal of constitutional amendments through popular initi ative petition, followed by popular vote, is a fairly recent development, but this plan has now been adopted by thirteen States. In these States also, there is a varying ease or difficulty in employing the plan of amendment. In Oregon and four other States it is as easy to amend the Constitution through initiative petition and popular vote as it is to enact a statute through the same devices. In each State that has adopted the plan of popular initiative, this plan has merely been added to the two already existing devices of constitutional conventions and proposal by legislative action. By the three methods of change more than 5,500 amendments were proposed in the forty-eight States between 1900-20, of which about three out of five were adopted.

The State

all of the American States except Nebraska, legislative power is exercised by a body composed of two houses. Constitutional amendments for the organization of a legis lative body composed of but one house were proposed in Oregon in 1912 and 1914, in Oklahoma in 1914 and in Arizona in 1916. All of these proposed amendments failed, but the plan of a unicameral legis lature was adopted by Nebraska in 1934. Since Vermont abandoned the unicameral system in 1836, the Nebraska legislature of 1937 was the first to be so organized. It is composed of a single chamber of 43 members elected on a non-partisan basis. In all other States, the smaller of the two houses is called the Senate. All but eight of the States call their larger house a House of Representatives; but the eight have such varying titles as Assembly, General Assembly and House of Delegates. Nearly half of the States use the term Legislature to designate the two houses together ; but twenty use the term Gen eral Assembly ; and three use the term Legislative Assembly. Massa chusetts still uses the term General Court, which was first employed in the Colonial Charter, and New Hampshire uses the same term. In view of the fact that the legislative bodies have somewhat varying names in the several States, it has been customary to refer to the larger of the two houses as the lower house, and to the smaller as the upper house.

To a large extent the exact number of members of the two houses, or of one of the two houses, is left to legislative determination, subject to constitutional restrictions. The size of the two houses varies a good deal from one State to another. The Minnesota Senate is the largest,

with sixty-seven members, and that of Delaware the smallest, with seventeen. The size of the lower house ranges from thirty-five in Delaware to 418 in New Hampshire. The membership of the lower houses is especially large in several of the New England States because of the system of town representation, but in these States the Senate is relatively small.

In a majority of States, senators are elected for four years and representative for two years. In some States, one-half of the mem bers of the Senate are elected every two years, so that the Senate has continuous membership, as contrasted with the House, whose membership is chosen as a whole at each election. In Alabama, Louisi ana, Maryland and Mississippi, however, four-year terms have been provided for members of both houses; and a number of States have a two-year term for members of both houses. i In some States financial measures must originate in the lower house; and in most of the States the Senate has certain powers with respect to confirmation of executive appointments. The provisions for im peachment of public officers also ordinarily prescribe that charges shall be brought by the lower house and tried by the Senate. But on the whole it may be said that, from the standpoint of legislation, the two houses of the American State Legislature have equal powers and do not represent points of view in the community. Distinct differences that existed in many States in earlier times have sub stantially ceased to exist, although in a number of States differences in territorial representation have grown up.

In the earlier State Governments the substantially equal representa tion of local areas was not grossly unfair, because of the absence of great inequalities in their population. To a large extent, the idea of geographical representation survives in a number of States. The lower houses of Connecticut, New Hampshire and Vermont, and both houses of Rhode Island, are based upon town representation; and with the growth of large urban communities this basis has become highly unequal. In 192o, New Haven with 162,00o inhabitants, had two representatives in the lower house of the Connecticut legislature, but so also did the town of Union with 257 inhabitants. Such inequality is not confined to New England.