Martin Sabo: The Making of the Modern Legislature

Known best as the former US
Representative of Minnesota's Fifth District, with twenty-eight years of
service including leadership roles on key committees, Martin Sabo also made
significant contributions to American political life earlier in his career,
while serving in the Minnesota state legislature.

Minnesota has long
been acknowledged as the state that works. Its government has been celebrated,
if occasionally contested, and has been emulated by other states for decades.
But today's modern, professional state legislature was not inevitable. In the
late 1960s-early 1970s Minnesota took a giant step toward a state government
that fairly represents all the state's regions and populations, one that
operates in public view. It was a government that shouldered increased
responsibility for the education and well-being of its citizens. And it served
as an operational model for legislatures around the country.

At the center of
those changes was a modest young man from tiny Alkabo, North Dakota, Martin
Olav Sabo. Sabo demonstrated an understanding of representative democracy and a
quality of leadership that made him a highly effective catalyst for positive
change. He spent his entire adult life in public service, but it was during his
years as DFL minority leader and as speaker of the Minnesota House that he did
his most transformative and enduring work--remaking legislatures for the better.
In Martin Sabo, award-winner author Lori Sturdevant transports readers
to the farm and the city, to the campaign trail and the capitol, and to the
rooms where so many things happened.

Enhancing Sabo's rich
legacy, this volume focuses attention on his early career and the systemic,
foundational contributions to governance his efforts accomplished.