1899 First Political and Social Conference, Buffalo.
June 27th to July 4th
About 900 attended the six-day-long Buffalo Conference. It was said to be the "first national gathering of real reformers ever held".
(The earlier reform conventions that happened at same time as the Chicago world fair and at San Francisco apparently were gatherings of many types of people, or were not national in scope.)
And it was more than just national (U.S.) actually - Tyson, of Toronto and other Canadians were there as well.
Several Canadian reformers attended the six-day event:
Bryan, George J. Toronto, Ontario
Crawford, Rev. E.E. St. Thomas, Ontario
Macoun, James Ottawa, Ontario
McLean, D.J. and wife Bridgebury,Ontario
McLean, William Bridgebury, Ontario
Marsh, G. Fred Thornbury, Ontario
Rowe, Rev. Elliot C. Toronto, Ontario
Sinclair, Calvin Bridgeport, Ontario
Tarr, S.R. WoodstockOntario
Robert Tyson Toronto, Ontario
Watson, Dr. Albert D. Toronto, Ontario
Prof. Thomas E. Will Manhattan, Kansas (see below)
Wrigley, George Toronto, Ontario
Wrigley, G. Weston, Toronto, Ontario
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(Non-Canadian attendees listed below)
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see D.L. Record July 1899 285/638
#285 - Direct legislation record v. 1-10 (May 1894-Dec 1903). - Full View | HathiTrust Digital Library
Arena 1901
Pomeroy on National Social and Political conference
#7 - The Arena v.25 1901 Jan-Jun. - Full View | HathiTrust Digital Library
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Conference was on Direct Legislation but STV used in elections
1899 Conference used STV to elect the nine-member Committee on Resolutions.
The Board of Election was made up of advocates of the Swiss Free list, the Hare-Spence system and the Gove system.
Hare-Spence was determined to be the most suitable for this particular election.
Directions to voters:
Write on this ballot five names in the order of your choice. Put first the candidate that you like best; second, the one you like next best; and so on.
Your vote will count for one candidate only.
If you first choice has more votes than he needs, or has so few votes that he cannot be elected, then your vote will go to your second or some subsequent choice, therefore all votes will be used and none wasted."
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Originally five members were to be elected to the Committee on Resolutions, but later it was decided to elect nine.
so voters were newly advised to write nine names. (this was optional preferential voting - not all wrote nine names.)
28 candidates were in the running.
198 votes cast quota 22 (Hare)
Two elected on first count.
Three elected at end with partial quota.
10 exhausted votes so the promise that all votes would be used proved to be untrue.
The report said the "unusually number of exhausted votes" (as if 5 percent is a large proportion) was explained as being due to an unusually large number of candidates (more than three for each open seat) and the fact that some voters did not mark nine names.
(The exhausted votes were examined, and it was found that each contained names of elected members - just the vote itself was directed to those people after they had already been elected.
so it was truthfully reported that "every voter is represented by one or more members of the Committee,"
The report went on to say that that "result could have been secured by no other method of election" -- the Swiss Free list would have depended on party labels; the Gove system though might have produced the same result.
(the last unsuccessful candidate in the running saw his votes transferred although his elimination was enough in itself to determine winners.)
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Membership at the conference was significant
Laurence Gronlund author of Co-operative Commonwealth
W.E. Boynton of Ashtabula, Ohio (the first city in U.S./Canada to use STV)
W.T. Lafollette Sioux Falls, S. Dakota
Eltweed Pomeroy Newark N.J. (he later reviewed the Conference in the Arena)
George Shibley Chicago, Illinois (author on electoral reform)
Carl Vrooman Parsons, Kansas
Woodruff, C.H. and Mrs. C.H. Woodruff Buffalo, NY
John R. Commons (see Montopedia blog) (author on electoral reform)
Frank Parsons. (author on electoral reform)
Prof. Thomas E. Will Manhattan, Kansas
(author of “A Menace to Freedom: The College Trust,” Arena 26 (September, 1901))
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Eltweed Pomeroy later reported on the 1899 Conference and set out plans for a second Conference at Detroit in 1901. He notes that three months ahead of the 1901 event, 1200 had said they will attend, 49 of them Canadians.
see Montopedia blog "1901 Detroit Social and Political Conference"
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As the title of Prof. Thomas E. Will's book (mentioned above) implies, many of those attending had been fired from their respective colleges and universities, so a move was made to establish a free-thinkers' "College of Social Science".
A committee ws organized to get on with its establishment -- John R. Commons, Frank Parsons, George Shibley. (295/638)
College of Social Science was to offer these courses:
Principle of Co-operation and Competition, including Self-government;
Evolution of Taxation for Public Purposes,
Evolution of Legislative Machinery;
Legal Aspects of Progressive Movements; etc.
College of Social Sciences did not get off ground.
(mentioned that J. Allen Smith was ejected from the Marietta College for his beliefs.
He was author, with Alfreda Allen Smith (his daughter), of Growth and Decadence of Constitutional Government (1930).
Three years later, a sequel to the Conference was held in Detroit, again on the border with Canada.
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housekeeping:
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