Feud

In the State of Washington last week, citizens drew up a petition for the recall/- of Governor Roland H. Hartley, filed it with their Secretary of State. He approved. When 97,576 voters have signed this petition there will be a special election to determine whether or not Governor Hartley shall remain in office for the rest of his term.

Governor Hartley is charged with: 1) "preventing the free expression of the will of the people through their representatives in the Legislature;" 2) failing to put into effect appropriations and laws for state institutions; 3) unjustly removing three University of Washington regents in order to appoint his friends to their offices.

Behind the recall petition is a nine-year battle between Governor Hartley and Dr. Henry Suzzallo, who was dismissed as President of the University of Washington by a Hartley-packed board of regents three weeks ago (TIME, Oct. 18). The squall began during the War when Mr. Suzzallo of the Labor Industries Board urged that Mr. Hartley, then a potent lumberman, should put his burly lumberjacks on an eight-hour day. The two men did not become any better friends when Mr. Hartley became Governor in 1925 and smashed into Mr. Suzzallo's scheme for a bigger, better and more expensive state education program.

/-The recall was part of the state reform movement which began during Roosevelt's regime. To dat, more than half of the states west of the Mississippi have adopted the recall. This piece of political machinery provides that when a certain percentage of the voters of a state sign a petition charging an official (governor, judge, etc.) with violation of his oath of office, there shall be an election held within from 20 to 90 days to oust or support the official in question.