The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1867-08-19
Personal representation.

The growing feeling in favor of the repre-
sentatiOn of minorities, both here and in Eng
land, is one of the many proofs that, however
attached people may be to the principle of de-
mOcracy, they are not yet satisfied that they
have hit on the best mode of applying it.
The people, even of New York city, really
want good government; they really want
good men in office; if they did not we should
be ready this moment for Mr.. Cushing's ''man
on horseback" But they have no power to
secure a good government and good men in
Office, because they possess no adequate con-
troll over the nominations made by party
leaders. nomination once made is a finality;
fit or unfit, it must be sustained at the peril
of the odium of "treason to the party" or
the more real and serious responsibility of
"giving aid to the enemy" Once overthrow
the oligarchy of wire-pullers, make it possible
in some way for the people to withhold their
approval when incompetent or dishonest men
are put into nomination, and other political
reforms would speedily follow.
1t would appear, at first sight, that power
which, like that under discussion, is exercised
by wholly irresponsible private citizens, is of a
so purely moral nature that it cannot be
reached by legislation, but must be left to the
good sense of the people to deal with. But
this is precisely what we have been doing now
for many years, and with only the result of
seeing party despotism grow stronger and
stronger And the reason is that our political
organization, being based entirely upon local
districts, and multiplying to excess the num-
Der of officials chosen by popular vote, affords
every facility for the manipulations of wire
pullers. If it is possible, either by statute or
constitutional provision, to remove these pecu-
liar opportunities and temptations, the evil
will in q %, of
1t is not desired to interfere in any way with
the legitimate action of party organizations.
These are an indispensable instrumentality in
enabling hke-minded men to combine their
scattered forces and bring them to bear upon
definite objects-thus converting latent power
into active power. But what we do need is to
give individual opinion chance to make itself
felt upon these organizations, and render it
possible to ''scratch" bad nomination with
out practically voting for the opposite candi-
date.
Mr.. Hare's plan of personal representation,
to which attention has been so widely directed
of late years. promises to accomplish this
obect and we wish to suggest what seems to
be a feasible way of adapting the leading prin-
ciple of his plan to our American community
and institutions. 1t is certain that, in the
form in which he has developed it, it is so
complicated and tedious that, whether intrin-
sically good or bad, it never could obtain ap-
prOval or even serious consideration among
our people. Whether the fact is to our credit
or not, we may make up our minds at the
start that no plan has any chance of adoption
among us which is not easily and readily un--
derstoOd and which does not provide for as
certaining the result of an election as early as
the day after it takes place.
The undue stress laid, as we'll by Mr.. Hare
himself as by all who have advocated his plan,
upon unessential details, which concern
merely the method of putting it in practice,
has had the effect OF drawing the attention
away from the essential principle of his
scheme. The essential and fundamental prin-
ciple is simply this-that it is the people who
are represented, and not the place, and that,
therefore, constituencies should be personal,
and not local. According to this plan if
citizen of Syracuse wished to vote for Horace
Greeley for Congress, or citizen of Brooklyn
for Millard Fillmore, he would have the right
to do so; his vote for this candidate would
count for him with those cast in every other
section of the State; and the constituency of
the successful candidate would be those who
voted for him, wherever they happened to
reside.
This is the simple and philosophical feature
of Mr.. Hare's plan, which has obtained the
unqualified commendation of Mr.. Mill and
other thinkers the rest of his scheme con-
sists of devices for obtaining an absolutely
equal representation of a community upon this
general plan devices adapted, perhaps to
the English people, but so utterly foreign to
the character and habits of our people that
they may be passed over without description.
1t is very certain that community which has
almost universally adopted the principle of
plurality in elections, for the sake OF the
speedy result, will not enter into an elaborate
calculation of quotas, and potter over the
''distribution of the surplus" in order that
the oanvassing of votes may be theoretically
fair and every minority exactly represented.
What our people want is legislature repre-