he legislature is
to perform the inferior but still necessary functions that will
necessarily remain in its hands, an attempt should certainly be made to
obtain a better quality of representation. No direct system of state
government can constitute any really substantial improvement on the
existing system, unless either the legislature is deprived of all really
essential functions, or the quality of its membership improved.

The legislature, or some representative body corresponding to it,
cannot, however, be deprived of certain really essential functions. The
task of preparing legislation for reference to the people, so that a
question of public policy will be submitted in a decisive and acceptable
form, belongs naturally to a representative body; and the same statement
is true respecting the legislative work essential to the administration
of a state's business affairs. The supply bills demand an amount of
inspection in detail, which can obtain only by expert supervision; and
so it is in respect to various minor legislative matters which do not
raise question of general policy but which amount to little more than
problems of local administrative detail. A representative body must be
provided which shall perform work of this kind; and again, it must be
said that existing legislatures would perform these more restricted
functions even worse than they have performed a completer legislative
duty. Their members are experts in nothing but petty local politics.
They are usually wholly incapable of drawing a bill, or of passing
intelligently on matters either of technical or financial detail. If
they represent anything, it is the interest of their district rather
than that of the state. The principle of direct legislation, in order to
become really constructive, must bring with it a more effective
auxiliary machinery than any which existing legislatures can supply.

The kind of machinery needed can be deduced from the character of the
work. The function of the representative body, needed under a system of
direct legislation, is substantially that of a legislative and
administrative council or commission. It should be an experienced body
of legal, administrative, and financial experts, comparatively limited
in numbers, and selected in a manner to make them solicitous of the
interests of the whole state. They should be elected, consequently, from
comparatively large districts, or, if possible, by the electorate of the
whole st