where an official act of the Governor has not been authenticated or attested by the Great Seal, and there has never been any request, there has never been any refusal, to affix that seal, and, because that official act was not contemplated during the official recess of the legislature, it is too late now, by any nunc pro tunc process to get the seal on and make the order valid that was invalid.

Now, then, I have thought to touch upon the broader ques tions rendering this order of removal invalid, for the utter arbitrariness, the utter want of good faith, that characterizes. the executive action. It is not my disposition to linger on that, it is not my desire to indulge in any language that will offend any members of the committee with reference to the legislative act. I do not need to do that. The mere transcript of the proceedings held in the executive office is the most seathing arraignment that could possibly be presented as to the executive action in that respect, and further discussien on that proposition, owing to the limits of time, I leave to my associate.

Mr. John A. Aylward: Mr. Chairman and Senators: I quite agree with the gentleman who objected to argument. I presume it was based on the ground that there was not much need for argument, and that is our position. Under the testimony here and under the showing there isn't much occasion for any argument at all. It has been made, I think, under the testimony, plain enough, and the hour is enough to call your attention to it, and we thank you for the courtesy given to Mr. Ekern in allowing his testimony to be made of record, and wo thank you for the time briefly to call attention to it.

I do not want the senator who is going to Congress (Senator Browne) to go away with the wrong impression that ther. is any personal feeling between Governor McGovern and mys if. Not in the least. It is true I was a candidate against him. I' was because I held the office of Governor of Wisconsin in the very highest esteem, second only to the office of president of the United States, and it is because we believe the Governor has not lived up to the dignity of the office that this heating is brought on here. There is no personal feeling. We have been personal friends and are personal friends. So much so that I was requested to act upon his reception committee on

the 6th day of January last, and thought it an honor, and was pleased to accept and serve on his reception committee.

Neither is there any politics in the matter. The senator who is going to Washington (Senator Browne) seems to lay stress on the fact that we are paid attorneys. I wonder if he ever went into court as a paid attorney, and, if he did, I wonder if he thought that he was disgracing himself. Those things do not come well from attorneys. You might as well talk of a paid physician performing his duties, or a paid minister performing his duties.

Neither is there any politics in this matter. I have one set principle with respect to my practice. I will not go into all cases, but, when I go into a case, neither religion nor politics nor friendship will prevent me from the proper performance of my duties, and, lest there be any misunderstanding with respect to that, I want to say although I am a democrat that I have not sought to make any democratic thunder out of this, because there is no opportunity. While it is true that the Governor and other officials here who happen to be republicans have violated the Corrupt Practices Act, and violated the primary law, and violated the election law, I have not the least doubt you can go out and find in the last election that the democrats have violated them just as openly and just as eft on, and there isn't anything to be gained on that and, as I raid to a senator last night, I wish that the matter might be fully examined and some law passed that would stop the open, persistent violation of those laws.

I said in opening that I was sorry that the Governor did not see fit to appear in this proceedings. I wish he had, an! I am sorry that any senator should have been afraid that either Mr. Olbrich or myself did not know enough to preserve and observe the equities and the courtesies of the occasion. Some one has said that you cannot wrestle with pitch without being defiled, and, in discussing evidence, you have to discuss it and offer it for what it is, you cannot change it, and if there are things in this testimony that are unpleasant, if certain conduct has been unseemly, if certain things were done under cover of the dark with the thought that they never would come to the light, if they have come to the light it was not our fault. It is our duty to bring them out.

Now, then, passing from that, if the committee please, we believe this, that the testimony here justifies this body in finding that there is no vacancy in the office of insurance commissioner in this state. We believe that the testimony justifies the committee in finding that the pretended removal was not made in good faith; that it was arbitrary, and we believe that the testimony will show that the Governor, in attempting to make a removal, proceeded without jurisdiction, absolutely without jurisdiction in the matter, and the testimony will justify the committee in finding, even if the Governor had jurisdiction, that there was no cause for action shown, and we believe that the evidence will warrant this body in taking the initiative in the formulation of laws that will prevent such unseemly proceedings as we have had in this building within the past two weeks.

It does not require, gentlemen, as the senator suggested, even to the lawyer members, and not even to the farmer mem ber of the committee, a discussion of the evidence to convince any man that is open for conviction that the Governor did not act in good faith. We have it from Mr. Belitz that it was his judgment, as the advisor of the Governor that it was the judg ment of Senator Wilcox as the legal advisor of the Governor, that it was necessary that the Governor act in this matter in good faith. So there isn't any opportunity anyway for discussion on that point. It is conceded as a legal proposition by the two officers and by the Governor himself, in pretending to act on that advice, that it was necessary that he should act in good faith, and not in an arbitrary way, and I submit to you gentlemen the testimony here shows a proceedings more arbitrary than history discloses was ever exercised by Lord Bacon or by Jefferys, or by any star chamber that ever held forth in this country. I do not wonder that the Governor did not ap pear, and I am not surprised that the gentlemen who have defended him here did not want a discussion of the testimony.

Let's see. What does Mr. Haugen say? Haugen says that on Sunday before the legislature met, or before he knew any thing about the transaction, before the Governor knew any thing about the hiring of an office or headquarters at the hotel, before Richards, before Rosa, before any of these men had been in the city, what does does Haugen say? Haugen says

the Governor told him on Sunday that he had determined fo remove Ekern. Not only that, but had determined to start negotiations as to who he should appoint in his place. That is the first thing to tie to. And then what? Then he consults the attorneys, Belitz and Wilcox, and they tell the Governo": "You have got to give him a hearing under the law." And what is the law? The law is Section 1966y, which provides that the commissioners-only such officer can be removed— Mr. Olbrich: That is 970.

Mr. Aylward: "All officers, except senators in Congress, and those specified in the preceding section, who are or shall be appointed by the Governor, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, or by the legislature without the concur rence of the Governor, may, for official misconduct, habitual or wilful neglect of duty, be removed by the governor, upon satisfactory proofs, at any time during the recess of the legislature"

Senator Husting: What section is that?

Mr. Aylward: That section is 970. Now, then, proceeding under this section to obtain "satisfactory proof" what does he do? Mr. Belitz testifies--and I have no word of criticista upon Mr. Belitz. I might say Mr. Belitz has had good training; he was a student in the office of the Governor, and, the next best thing to that I know of, he had some training in our office; he is a gentleman all the way through, and he is honest. and he is capable-what does he say: He says that before, the Monday before Ekern was brought on the carpet at all, that The and Wilcox were upstairs preparing a complaint, and preparing an order of removal. I wonder if any of these twelve senators who are lawyers have ever heard of such a proceeding? Senator Burke suggests that sometimes judges prepare their findings or prepare a form of judgment, but no judge ever in Wisconsin, has gone to work and prepared a judgment, or ordered a judgment prepared, before he had heard the evidence, and Belitz says that he and Wilcox were doing that thing. Not only that, but on the day of the hearing the testimony is that Ekern's testimony began at eleven o'clock, and before Mr. Ekern ever opened his mouth or offered any testimony, the order of his removal was already prepared. Do you wonder why the Governor did not appear? Came out in the

papers this morning and said he defied the senate. I tell you, gentlemen, he did not dare appear when the details of that conduct were coming out.

o'clock and he

That is ning

Senator Burke calls attention to the fact that the order in this case, the order pending in the Circuit Court of this county, was prepared, in part, in that way. Well, I will say for his benefit, and some of the others, that that order had been prepared and we were waiting just about ten days for them to walk into that trap, and they walked into it. But what did the judge do? That order was issued at three made it returnable at five o'clock. What for? To go to trial? No. Simply to show cause why they should not stop tearing down the Capitol building, that is all. And when they appeared at five o'clock, what took place? They wanted four days in which to decide what they wanted to do, and the judge gave them five days, and then they had a whole day to argue to the court what the law of the case was. days ago, and the judge has not decided it yet. But Governor McGovern could give cards and spades to Judge Stevens as to the conduct of business. In the first place he decides to remove the man, then he orders the complaint made and the order of the removal made, and then, having determined on those things, he issues an order to show cause and gives the man five minutes notice; hurries him into the hearing without opportunity of preparation, has the order prepared for his removal, offers his own testimony, and then won't allow Ekern even to finish his own testimony, won't hear Johnson, won hear Beedle, won't hear any other witness, because he has got to get through at twelve o'clock. Gentlemen, it is just as the senator said, they don't need argument in any place, in court or out of court, to establish that that order was not made in good faith, and there is not a lawyer of this body, when you go into session, that will stand up and say: "Gentlemen, I be lieve that order was made in good faith.” And yet our court decided-in the case of Dahl recently decided in the Supreme Court it must appear that the removing judge exercised his power in good faith, and, if that question is submitted, no senator, I do not care how prejudiced he is, will go on recor I and say under that record that Governor McGovern acted in good faith in making that removal.

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