On my initial visit to the Wisconsin Legislature I had the best time of anyone who has ever been there. I could not get in.
I could not get into the Senate Chamber because of a shift in time for when the session started. Instead, I was left outside to stalk the individual legislators and their aides and various passers-by. In essence I was left out with the \sharks,"" the lobbyists and those who wanted to talk to the legislators before the session began. They are called sharks because they circle and then, as if in a feeding frenzy, leap upon any poor legislator who wanders too close. They too were barred from entry into the ""Legislators only"" door. Unlike me, however, they called to one another by name, a fraternity of men in suits who could go up to every legislator and shake their hands and say a few words. More then a few legislators avoided them like the plague.
Strangely enough, I was not as much of a leper to the legislators. I was dressed in a leather jacket and jeans that had seen better days and was holding a notepad. More than a few random smiles and ""hellos"" came my way from those wandering in the golden passages reserved for legislators and staff. Security, of course, did not see it that way. Unlike the suited leaders of the state, they felt I was worthy of intense scrutiny of purpose. Perhaps this was because for more than a brief period I hovered around certain Senate offices, and watched the scurrying of staff people in and out. Someone was always running into the Senate Chamber, and then back out, heading up or down stairs at high speed, seemingly at random. At one point a senator with two aides walked out of the Senate Chamber and began hotly discussing some problem. Soon cell phones came out, and the three of them headed off into three separate directions. One aide re-entered the Senate Chamber, one headed toward Senate offices and the senator himself, followed closely by two or three sharks, headed in the general direction of the exit.
After about an hour of this meandering in the area of the Senate, waiting 15 minutes past the time the door was to originally have opened, I decided to leave for home. Along the way, though, I noticed something about where the sharks had been standing. The marble floors were cracking.
As I climbed down the stairs, I could not help but wonder if this was some meaningful protest by the Legislature's building, a building that had seen so much compromise and intense debate over what was best for the people. Could it be a warning that the major individual interests, the lobbyists, the sharks, were tearing down the foundations upon which the legislature had been started? Was it that by breaking down the common interest and trying to recognize and deal with each individual one, one is really breaking down the fundamental ideals of democracy upon which the Senate was based?
Then again, maybe it was just a crack.
Harlen L. Johnston is a third-year law student.
