The Opportunist: James W. Sullivan and the Origins of the Initiative and Referendum in the United States

Little remembered today, James W. Sullivan wrote the book that, more than any other, catalyzed the initiative and referendum movement in the United States. Crucial to the success of Sullivan’s Direct Legislation by the Citizenship through the Initiative and Referendum was his immersion in the labor radicalism of New York City in the 1880s, including as editor of the Boycotter and Union Printer and labor editor of Henry George’s Standard. Especially important in honing and publicizing his ideas was his tenure at the radical weekly Twentieth Century between 1889 and 1892. Forged in the bitter political and ideological conflicts, setbacks, and disappointments of the late 1880s, Direct Legislation showed “the radical world” a way to sidestep doctrinal fights about political economy and focus instead on knitting together a broad “opportunistic” coalition of labor and middle-class reformers with the power to remake political institutions.