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The Executive Veto in Illinois

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Glenn R. Negley
Glenn R. Negley
Affiliation:
University of Illinois
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Extract

The original veto power in Illinois was vested in a council of revision, consisting of the governor and the justices of the supreme court, whose function was limited to a preview of legislative acts for the purpose of making recommendations in regard to their constitutionality. Practical difficulties hampered the effective operation of this council, especially the inability of justices to perform adequately their two sets of diverse duties. The constitutional convention of 1848 found it expedient, therefore, to reform the constitutional mandate of veto by concentrating the function in the governor.

Type
American Government and Politics
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 33 , Issue 6 , December 1939 , pp. 1049 - 1057
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1939

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References

1 Journal of the Constitutional Convention of the State of Illinois (Springfield, Ill., 1870); Debates and Proceedings of the Constitutional Convention of the State of Illinois (Springfield, Ill., 1870), 2 vols.

2 Constitutional Convention Bulletin: “The distrust of the legislature which developed rather promptly after the forming of the first state constitution led, however, to the conferring of a veto power upon the governor, and there has been a definite tendency toward an increase of this power.”

3 A motion to provide that the veto might be overridden by a majority of both houses was defeated, 47–11; likewise, a provision that the assembly, if it failed to re-pass a vetoed bill, might submit it to the people by a majority vote, was defeated, 53–12.

4 E.g., the statement of Mr. Snyder that “the veto power is contrary to the theory of our government … and, I say, if we permit a one-man power, or any other power, to step between the people and their representatives, we stand in the way of democratic government.”

5 Cf. Debel, N. H., The Development of the Veto Power of the Governor of Illinois (University of Illinois, 1917).Google Scholar For the sake of consistency, I have tried to follow the classification of vetoes used by Mr. Debel, in so far as this is derivable from his study. The conclusion to which Mr. Debel's investigation led him presents a veritable paradox of democratic government: “He [the governor] more nearly than any other officer in the state government represents all the people. Thus we have the strange spectacle of the veto power, once a royal prerogative, having become an indispensable power in the hands of a democratic executive.”

6 H.B. 32 (Old Age Pension), which Governor Homer vetoed during the special session of 1935–36, was re-passed by the assembly. Political circumstances operated in this trial of strength between governor and assembly; and it is but fair to remark that the ground of the governor's veto was a desire to maintain consistency with the federal enactment.

7 Senate, 35–7; House, 107–2; Ratification, 427, 821–60, 244.

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