¹ As far as the party division in the legislature is concerned, it should be sufficient to say that the Democrats counted among their members 21 representatives (8.5%) and one senator. On all matters, including that of organization of the House and Senate, a Democrat in the Vermont legislature is indistinguishable by his voting behavior from a Republican.

² Much of the material presented in this section is based on reports of participant observers who were employed in the offices of the Associated Industries and the Vermont Farm Bureau during the 1951 legislative session.

³ The Barre Granite Association included among its members almost all of the 117 granite companies in the state, and had joined the AIV as an association, paying a lump sum annually as dues.

⁴ The sample of legislators who were interviewed is not statistically representative of the membership of the 1951 session of the Vermont legislature. Forty members of the 246 representatives were interviewed, and 16 of the 30 senators. Half of the members of the House sample were selected by the participant observers in the Associated Industries and the Farm Bureau as either accessible to the interest groups under study, influential in the legislature, or both accessible and influential. The remaining half of the House sample was selected on a random basis. It was originally planned to interview the entire membership of the Senate, but interviews were completed with only slightly more than half of the senators.

Despite the fact that the entire sample was not chosen on a random basis, the sample as it was drawn is representative in certain characteristics considered relevant. The geographic distribution of the members and the party division in the legislature are quite accurately reflected in the sample, as is the distribution by previous legislative experience. The 40 members of the House under-represent slightly the proportion of representatives from the smaller towns, and the proportion of farmer-representatives, and over-represent slightly the proportion of lawyer-representatives.

⁵ These perspectives and the analyses to follow must of necessity be impressionistic and based on rough quantification. The sample is too small to allow more rigorous validation. The number of representatives who fall into each group should be kept in mind.

The Senate sample is too small to analyze separately. All quantifications are based on the representatives. The findings reported on the representatives appear as tendencies in the Senate. The two samples have not been combined, since the two populations differ in intrinsic characteristics.

⁶ After the legislator had completed his discourse on “the most important problems,” specific issues were introduced unless volunteered by respondent. Since the interest group activity on these issues was available from the participant observers, one purpose of the legislative survey was to complement this story with a picture of how the process appeared to the legislator. Accordingly, it was planned to include discussion of the questions on which the AIV had been most active and interested: the occupational disease and unemployment compensation bills which had been involved in the business-labor negotiations. Each interview was also intended to include a discussion of the Governor's budget, the proposed State Police merger, the proposed cut in the Vermont Development Commission appropriations, the “patchwork” taxes, and the sales-income tax alternatives.

In addition, the interviews were planned to include discussion of two matters on which the Vermont Farm Bureau had been active: a proposal to permit the sale of colored oleomargarine; and two proposals relating to the St. Lawrence Seaway, one memorializing Congress to approve the Seaway, and another establishing an agency in Vermont which would be authorized to negotiate for power resulting from any St. Lawrence development.

The interviews did not follow a prescribed sequence, nor were they confined to these topics. They did not always achieve complete coverage, either because respondent lacked information or interest in the proposed items, or because the interview developed respondent's concepts of party, faction, interest group, executive roles, and issues by other means.

⁷ This division was a real surprise. Preliminary talks with knowledgeable people had described the political organization of the Republican party as dividing between east and west, with an alternation in office for the two sides of the mountains.

⁸ Though the data available from the interviews do not bring it into clear focus, there is a further variable related to the informal leadership structure of the legislature. To some members, service in the legislature is a Btrictly amateur undertaking, pursued for many motives, it is true: out of a sense of civic duty; as an enormously entertaining pastime to relieve the rigor of a northern winter; a varied social occasion; a chance to make business contacts or advance personal status in the home community. To others, it is part of their professional vocation. The professionals may go no further than the legislature, and may not expect to. Or they may be moving rapidly through a series of public offices. They may be freshmen or have many years of experience. In any case, the professional member must bring to his role a different perspective of the process and a different stance in his own activities than does the amateur. Further research is needed to develop the relationships between these roles and the materials analyzed in this case study.