The Nevada journal., 1856-04-04

! REGISTRATION LaW.-Ihe San francisco
Herald comes out in favor Of registration
law similar to the bill introduced in the As
sembly by Mr. Wcch. The object of the bill
of Mr.. Nyelch, in the opinion of that journal,
"is, as its title indicates, to put an ehectual
stop to the ballot.box stuffing, colonization
and corruption which, We regret to say, have
characterized our elections in times past" The
Herald further comments upon the subject as
follows, every word of which we fully endorse
"In the drafting of bill providing for the registry
of legal voters the utmost circumspection should be
used and care should be taken that under it neither
corruption would be legalized the rights of any
person, legally entitled to vote, be trenched upon
It is very delicate subject to legislate upon, and
trust that neither Mr.. Welchs bill nor any other
bill of similar character, will be passed without be-
ing subjected to the most rigid scrutiny, both in the
Senate and Assembly Of the necessity for the pas
sage of faw of the kind, doubt be entertained,
and though it may, perhaps in some cases be incon
venent for some persons to go to the trouble OF hay
ing their names registered yet We think that every
good citizen and every honest man would prefer to
have his right-the right inherent placed under GER
tain restrictions, rather than allow his vote and the
vote of every other respectable citizen to be neutral
lied by few corrupt and unscrupulous politicians
II is plain truth that every right has its correspond
ing duty. If it be the right of every freeman to
VOTE it is also his duty to that not only his vote
but also the votes of his fellow citizens shall effect
the object for which they were deposited in the ballot
box and if that cannot be effected in any other way
but by the abridgemcnt of his rights, he should
cheerfulv submit. The bill introduced by mr.
Wech applies only to the incorporated towns cities
of the State. To extend the Registry Law to the
mining districts would be extremely iDjudicious,
nasmuch as the population of these districts is
in its character. Besides, a Registry Law is
not required in the mines, for there, general
eral thing the voters in every precinct acquainted
with each other, and the rights and disabilities of
every individual we'll understood by the Judges
and Inspectors of Election if Board of Registry
Commissioners had been employed for six months
before in preparing accurate lists for their guidance
The candid remarks of our San Francisco
contemporary present a striking contrast to the
course which the State Journal has seen fit to
pursue in relation to Registry Law. As the
Herald has decided leaning towards Democ-
racy, we consider the foregoing extract suffi'
cient refutation of the assertion of the State
Journal, that the bill of Mr. Welch was intro.
duced for the purpose of creating Office for
Know Nothings. The assertion, too of the
latter paper, that all the Eastern States which
have tried Registry Laws have repealed them,
is untrue. A Registry Law exists in Massa'
chusetts, and election returns in that State are
always made on the evening of election day
and, since 1874, full returns from the whole
State have been published in Boston the next
morning after the day ofelection. San Fran
cisco is fast city in many respects but tits
ward officers have frequently been so slow in
making election returns rs to induce the belief
that the vote from the whole State was wanted
by those officers, to ascertain, before they made
their own returns, the exact amount of ballot
box stuffing necessary to elect their favorites.