In sum, the overwhelming "grass roots" response which Con Con received on November 5th both cut across and went far beyond the normal partisan divisions which exist in this state. The General Assembly must now ask itself whether a bi-partisan convention, limited to delegates representing only two of the major political forces in this State, and likely to respond in only a limited fashion to currents of change which have overtaken our state in the last 100 years, will provide an adequate response to people's mandate of November 5th. "NON-PARTISAN" POLITICS SOMETHING NEW FOR ILLINOIS Non-partisan constitutional conventions are not a new phenomenon. At least three were held during the reform era of the second decade of the present century: Nebraska in 1919-20, Massachusetts in 1917-19, and Ohio in 1912. All three proposed substantial constitutional changes which the voters approved. More recently, the non-partisan conventions of Rhode Island in 1944, 1951, 1955 and 1958, and of Alaska and Hawaii, have met with similar success, although the experience of the latter two is somewhat atypical because of the absence in those states of long-established political systems and traditions comparable to those in other states in the 20th century. Against this record of success at the polls, however, stands the glaring exception of the Maryland Convention of 1967-68. It is generally conceded that the Maryland delegates, who were elected in a single non-partisan election, were both able and conscientious. The parties undoubtedly had their preferences, but elimination of party labels from the ballot had the predictable effect of encouraging voter selection on the basis of merit, rather than simple party affiliation. While for the most part the delegates were known as civic and professional leaders, nearly half of them had prior experience in public office. Interestingly, none of those who emerged as natural leaders during the Convention was actively engaged in party politics. Although the opinion is frequently expressed that "party responsibility" is a valuable, if not indispensable, pre-requisite to efficient decision-making, the Maryland Convention operated as or more efficiently than the partisan and bi-partisan conventions held recently in other states. The Maryland delegates were generally resistant to the external pressures of special interest groups, but in the end, the reform document which they produced was supported by the leadership of both major political parties, by business and organized labor, and by the civic leadership of the state. In view of this support of the massed leadership of the state, the results of the referendum on the proposed new Constitution held on May 14, 1968 were as surprising as they are instructive. Contrary to expectations that the Constitution would win approval without trouble, it was rejected by 56 percent of the 650,000 people who turned out to vote, nearly half of the state's 1.4 million registered voters. Post-election analysis attributes two of the causes of defeat to the Convention's decision to submit its entire work to the people in a single package, and to the failure of the Constitution's proponents to mount the kind of intensive," grass roots" campaign that is always vital to the success of any constitutional referendum. The Constitution's most vocal opponents consisted mainly of two loosely organized, but nonetheless effective alliances: county officials in rural areas whose positions, secure under the 1867 Constitution, were not mentioned in the new one; and a group of Baltimore surburbanites who feared the potential development of some form of metropolitan government which, they thought, would necessarily result in higher taxes and possibly racial integration of their schools. The Maryland Convention's proposals would undoubtedly have fared better if these two opposition groups been divided by means of separate submissions and if there had been a better organized campaign for voter approval after the Convention's adjournment. A third factor in the defeat was that both the Maryland Convention and the referendum on its proposals were held at a time of grave social unrest and civil disorder. The Convention, while including the best of the state's civic leadership, did not enlist the direct participation of those people, black or white, who were most directly affected by this social crisis. A document labeled as reform, produced by those standing largely outside the swirl of social crisis, could only have increased the wariness of an already uneasy electorate. 20 Illinois experienced a similar period of unrest during its Convention of 1862, held during the Civil War. The proposals of this Convention were also rejected by the voters. See "Report of the Committee on Constitutional Revision," Appendix C, supra, at 70-71. On the whole, the Maryland experience is both encouraging and instructive. First, it demonstrates the workability of the non-partisan selection process for convention delegates. The Maryland Convention cannot be faulted in terms of either the quality of the delegates who were elected, or of the document which they produced under the full scrutiny of the news media and the public. In short, minimization of partisan and special interest pressures at a constitutional convention pays off in constitution-making as opposed to legislating. Second, the first two factors contributing to defeat of the Maryland Constitution are clearly correctable, the one by separate submissions of the more controversial proposals, and the other by an intensive post-convention campaign to increase voter understanding. The third factor contributing to defeat of the Maryland Constitution, social crisis, is a fact of contemporary society which we cannot escape. A constitutional convention cannot itself solve all the social ills of our times. But the Maryland experience suggests, at a minimum, that if a new charter for government is to meet the people's approval, the convention which frames it should properly include the representatives of all the people whose approval is being sought. In the end, constitution-making is not simply an exercise in legal draftsmanship. Nor can it be viewed solely in terms of the classical approach of bringing greater efficiency and economy to the operation of state government. Ultimately, the process of renewal and repair of the basic structure and machinery of government is aimed at nothing less than increasing the ability of government to respond more adequately to the tough, expensive and terribly human problems of our society. In this process, where people must strive to find common ground, there is no room for the narrower "clash of party and interest." Con Con, then, offers both a tremendous challenge and an exciting opportunity to the people of this state. By opening the delegate selection process to all the people, and allowing full expression to be given to all the contending forces of our society, we may do much to end the mutual hostility, suspicion and divisiveness which we, as a people, cannot long endure. With patience, understanding, intelligence, and human decency toward one another, we the people of Illinois, acting within the framework of the law, can and will establish a new tone, and chart new directions, for the government under which we live. (From the icago Bar Record, December, 1963) Can Public Officials Be Delegates to the By WILBUR S. LEGG WITH the approval on Novem ber 5, 1968, of a constitutional convention for Illinois, attention has turned to the composition of the convention. One of the questions now presented is whether any public official, and particularly a member of the General Assembly, can have seat in the convention.1 Article XIV, Section 1 of the Illinois Constitution provides that the qualification of delegates to a constitutional convention "shall be the same as that of members of the Senate.' In addition to requirements of citizenship, age and residence, and certain disqualifications, Article IV of the Constitution provides as follows in Section 3: "No judge or clerk of any court, Secretary of State, Attorney General, State's Attorney, recorder, sheriff, or collector of public revenue, member of either House of Congress, or person holding any lucrative office under the United States or this State, or any foreign government, shall have a seat in the General Assembly; Provided, that appointments in the militia, and the offices of notary public and justice of the peace, shall not be considered lucrative. Nor shall any person holding any office of honor or profit under any foreign government, or under the government of the United States, (except postmasters whose annual compensation does not exceed the sum of three hundred dollars) hold any office of honor or profit under the authority of this State." This article is derived from a subcommittee report prepared for the CBA Committee on Constitutional Revision by the author with Robert Roos, Jr., William Singer, Chester Kamin and Peter Tomei, who contributed to the work underlying its preparation; Arnold Flamm has contributed valuable criticism. CONCLUSIONS The conclusions of this article are that: 1. A senator-elect to the Illinois General Assembly cannot hold any lucrative office in the Illinois, United States or any foreign government when he takes his seat in the Senate; 2. This lack of any lucrative office is a qualification of his right to take his seat in the Senate; 3. Article XIV, Section 1 requires a delegate to have the same qualifications as a senator; 4. A qualification of a delegate's right to take his seat in the convention is that he hold no lucrative office in the Illinois, United States or any foreign government at the time he takes his seat; 5. A seat in either the House or the Senate of the Illinois General Assembly is a lucrative office, as is any compensated office in the Illinois, United States or any foreign government; 6. A delegate-elect cannot hold a seat in the House or the Senate of the Illinois General Assembly or any other compensated office in the Illinois, United States, or any foreign government, when he takes his seat as a convention delegate; 7. The common law rule is that an office holder's acceptance of a second office incompatible with his first office automatically vacates his first office unless holding the first office specifically makes the holder ineligible for election or appointment to the second office; 8. A member of the Illinois House or Senate, or a holder of any compensated office in the Illinois, United States or any foreign government, who takes a seat in the Illinois Constitutional Convention thereby ipso facto vacates his seat in the House or Senate or his other office; 9. If a legal dispute arises, a circuit court has jurisdiction in mandamus action to determine that a vacancy exists in the General Assembly, and to order certification of the vacancy by the proper officer to the Governor to be filled in accordance with Article IV, Section 2 of the Illinois Constitution of 1870; 10. If a seat on the Illinois Constitutional Convention were itself an office, Article V, Section 5 of the Constitution of 1870 would make the governor, lieutenant governor, auditor, secretary of state, superintendent of public instruction and attorney general ineligible to take a delegate's seat at any time during the term of their office even if they resigned prior to the end of that term. The available authority is in conflict on whether a seat in the convention is a state office. Since it is unlikely that these state officers would wish to vacate their offices to take seats as delegates, this question is not discussed at any length in this paper. From the foregoing it can be seen that these conclusions are based, not on the general common law prohibition against one person's holding two offices simultaneously, but but rather on the qualifications of a senator under Article IV, Sections 3 and 4, which Article XIV, Section 1 makes also the qualifications of a delegate. Qualifications of a Senator Article XIV, Section 1 requires delegates to have the qualifications of a state senator. The qualifications of a senator are found in Article IV, under three sections (§§ 3, 4, 5) grouped together under the heading "Eligibility And Oath." Section 3 enumerates a number of characteristics which determine whether a state senator or state representative may have a seat in the General Assembly." Section 4 lists certain characteristics which bar a person from having a seat in the General Assembly. Among the characteristics required in Section 3 are age, residence and citizenship requirements followed by the language quoted above to the effect that any person holding lucrative office in the government of Illinois, the United States or any foreign country shall not have a seat in the General Assembly. This grouping of required characteristics evolved quite deliberately in the Convention of 1869-70, and it appears evident from the grouping that all the required senatorial characteristics were "qualifications" of senators which were incorporated into Article XIV, Section 1 as the qualifications of delegates. The Constitution of 1848 contained no qualifications for delegates. The legislature, however, required in the enabling act for the Convention of 1869-1870 that the delegates take an oath to qualify as members of the Convention. The legislature's authority to require such an oath was questioned in the Convention on the ground that the legislature could not require what the Constitution of 1848 had not required, and the Convention was embroiled for nearly four days at the opening of its session on this point.8 Thereafter the sense of the Convention appeared to be to specify in the new constitution both qualifications and an oath for members. Mr. Sedgwick early proposed as a resolution for the consideration of the Committee on the Legislative Department that "no judge of any court of law or equity, Secretary of State, Attorney General, county attorney, recorder, clerk of any court of record, sheriff or collector of the public revenue, member of either House of Congress, or person holding any lucrative office under the United States or this State, or any foreign government, shall have a seat in the General Assembly, or in any Convention called for the purpose of revising, altering or amending the Constitution of the State; Provided . . .” (Underlining added.) Except for the underlined portion, this language was copied, with minor changes not pertinent here, from Article III, Section 29 of the Constitution of 1848. The underlined portion extended its application to delegates to a convention. Thereafter, the Committee on Amendments submitted a majority report and two minority reports regarding the Amendments Article to the Constitution.10 The majority report and the Haines-Springer minority report each provided for delegates in the same number and having the same qualifications as members of the House of Representatives. The Archer-Brown minority report deliberately adhered to the policy of the Constitution of 1848 by omitting any qualification for delegates. The Haines-Springer minority report was adopted by the Convention. Later, because it was felt that the number of representatives would be so large as to make unwieldy a convention of similar number, the number of delegates was changed to twice the number of senators, and the qualifications to those of senators.12 Finally the Committee on Revisions and Adjustments incorporated into Article IV, Section 3 the prohibition of Article III, Section 29 of the Constitution of 1848, as well as the citizenship, residence and age requirements.13 A further section providing that certain con |