156 EMPLOYMENT OF THE PLEBISCITE ^454 



German influence, pressure, force or bribery among the 

 representatives voting. A drastic incident of such a char- 

 acter we have in the charges laid against the members of 

 the Danish Landsthing, who, in 1904, voted against the sale 

 of the Danish West Indies to the United States. " There 

 were in the Landsthing." so W. F. Johnson writes in The 

 North American Rcricn',^'^ " many members who were sus- 

 ceptible to German influence. Some were half German, or 

 were closely related by marriage to German families. Others 

 owned estates in Schleswig and Holstein, the Danish 

 provinces now held by Prussia. Others were deeply inter- 

 ested in trade with Prussia. So, after many weeks of in- 

 triguing, thirty-three members of the Landsthing, making 

 exactly one-half of that body, were prevailed upon to vote 

 against ratification." His assertion that universal regret 

 over the result was widespread in Denmark seems to be 

 borne out by the fact that in 191 6 the Landsthing approved 

 the purchase and a popular vote taken on the issue pro- 

 duced 283,694 votes in favor of and 157,596 against the 

 sale." From such a result we may well infer that if a 

 popular vote had been taken in 1904, it might have ap- 

 proved of the purchase of the Islands at the same time that 

 the Landsthing voted adversely. 



However, the possibility of influencing, by bribery or by 

 other means, the members of legislative bodies exists every- 

 where and at all times ; this is as true under normal con- 

 ditions as during the stress of a national crisis. There 

 seems to exist actually less danger of such corruption when 

 the legislature votes on the question of a change of govern- 

 ment, of peace and war, separation, or fusion, than when 

 it votes on internal, social or economic measures, for the 

 simple reason that in the former instance bribery might be 

 treated as high treason, conviction entailing ignominy or 

 death. While a legislature may be subject to forceful dis- 

 solution, it cannot be cajoled into doing the bidding of or 



" Tlie North American Review, Sept., 1916, pp. 389-390. 

 ^'^ See above, p. 126. 



