U'Ren became involved both in reform politics and spiritualism — a major intellectual fad of the era — and became involved with the prominent Luelling family, who were actively interested in both pursuits. In 1890, he campaigned vigorously for the Australian Ballot, which won in 1891. It was while he was involved in this campaign that he attended a séance, and met Mrs. Laure Durkee. Single Tax In 1892 U'Ren suffered a severe asthma attack and gave up his law practice. Mrs. Durkee knew that the Lewellings, a local fruit growing family, had often offered lodging and care to hard luck cases, such as U'Ren was. His health was slowly restored at the Lewellings farm. Mr. and Mrs. Seth Lewelling were reformers (with one family member writing "good government being to us what religion is to most people"). U'ren was already a convert to progressive causes, especially the Single Tax proposed by Henry George. Albert Lewelling gave him a copy of James W. Sullivan's book Direct Legislation by the Citizenship Through the Initiative and Referendum (1892) and U'ren decided to invest his time and effort in the cause. Direct Legislation League He was a leader of the People's Power League after 1892. U'Ren brought together representatives of the state Farmer's Alliance and labor unions to form the Direct Legislation League, of which he was named secretary. He had an express goal of implementing the three legs of direct democracy – Initiative, referendum, and recall. In 1894 U'Ren was elected chairman at the Populist Party convention, and won approval of an Initiative & Referendum platform plank. In 1896 U'Ren won a seat in the Oregon House of Representatives; however, in 1897 the House failed to organize, only holding a short special session in the fall of 1898. U'Ren worked the legislature during his term, without success, to gain approval for initiative and referendum. After his 1897 defeat, U'Ren reorganized the Oregon Direct Legislation League to broaden the base of initiative, referendum, and recall support. The new executive committee included bankers, the president of the state bar association, and The Oregonian editor Harvey W. Scott. U'Ren and the Direct Legislation League won passage of an initiative and referendum amendment in 1898. Under the constitution of the time, amendments had to be approved by two successive sessions of the legislature. By 1902 the legislature had approved the amendment and voters had ratified it.