So much for the authenticity of the books themselves which contain the laws upon which we all have to depend.  Now, coming to the form of the laws.  As I have already remarked, there is no committee on style.  There is no attempt whatever made at scientific drafting.  To give an example of what difference this may make in mere convenience, it is only a few weeks since, in Massachusetts, a chapter of law to protect the public against personal injuries caused by insolvent railway and street railway companies was drawn up by a good lawyer, and contained between twenty and thirty sections, or about three pages of print.  It was brought to another lawyer, certainly no better lawyer, but a legislative expert, who got all that was desired into one section of five lines.  There is no committee on style, there is no expert drafting.  The case of the recent Massachusetts statute declaring the common law to be the common law, and therefore jeopardizing the very object of the statute, will not be forgotten (see p. 188 above).  There are certain definite recommendations I should like to make.

First, adopt the provision that “no statute shall be regarded as repealed unless mentioned as repealed, and when a law is amended, the whole law shall be printed as amended in full.”  This would acquaint the legislature with the law already existing, before they proceed to change it.  Next provide that all laws shall be printed and published by a State publisher and the authenticity of all revisions be duly guaranteed by their being submitted to the legislature and re-enacted en bloc, as is our practice with revisions in Massachusetts and some as other States.  Third, the local or private acts should be separated from the public laws, and they might advantageously even be printed in a separate volume, as is done in some States already.  But who shall determine whether it is a private, local or special act, or a general law?  I can only answer that that must be left to the legislature until we adopt the system strongly to be recommended of a permanent, preliminary, expert draftsman.  Finally, no legislation must ever be absolutely delegated.  That is to say, even if a revision is drawn up by an authorized commission, their work should be afterward ratified by the legislature.  It is said, I think, that the constitution of Virginia, drawn up by a constitutional convention, was never ratified by the people.  If so, there is a grave constitutional doubt whether it or any part of it may not be repealed at any time by a simple statute.  But can a constituent body of the mass of the people, the fundamental and original political entity of the Anglo-Saxon world, be forbidden from delegating its legislative power, as its representatives themselves are forbidden?