Evening Republican, Volume 59, Number 68, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 11 April 1917 — Recall For Public Officials Reduces the Number of Undesirable Candidates [ARTICLE]

Recall For Public Officials Reduces the Number of Undesirable Candidates

By DR. MAURICE F. DOTY

of Chicago

Before election it is virtually impossible for the voters to know the fitness of candidates. Even business men with good facilities for selecting carefully their employees, make mistakes and have to discharge many because it is impossible to know what an applicant will amount to until actually on the job. The men from applying for a position they know they cannot fill. But i a man can just get elected to a public office he is safe for the term o t a office whether or not he is satisfactory to the voters who hired him. Hence the usual crop of undesirable candidates. ' r With such a blind and blundering system of hiring our public officials there should be some direct means of discharging the undesirably ones, other than at the regular elections. Whenever the people find themselves being “stung” by one of their officials, they should be able to call a special election and by majority vote remove him from office. Business men who insist upon the right to discharge undesirable agents should logically believe in the people having the right to recall undesirable public officials. The recall is very satisfactory to the cities which have it because crooks and incompetents do not campaign for an office in which they cannot be crooked and incomDetent. x?