The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1868-10-14
The Electoral Vote of Alabama.

PIoDl The Mobile Register
We cannot be too emphatic nor too per-
sistent in keeping before our people the para
mount Importance of registering and voting
at the November election. 1t has been truly
said that there Is no telling what day or an
election may bring forth; and, while we be-
lieve in all sincerity that the majority in the
Electoral College will be overwhelming for
Seymour, yet 1t is in range Of possibility that
the eight votes of Alabama will be necessary
to decide the question. These eight votes lost
to the Democratic majority of the College, and
cast against us, will be equal to sixteen-the
number of the large and important State of
Illinois.
Here, then, is the main point against which
to guard. Not only must we use the vote of
our State, but we must prevent It's use-in q
doubly telling sense - against us by the
enemy.
Alabama is pronounced State Of the Union,
and in the Union. Congress, in the plenitude
of its power, has pretended to be merciful. II
has said to the "erring sister,"
"Come to these clear flowing fountains,
Where you may wash and be clean"-
And the "erring sister" has come. She has
drunk of the bitter waters of reconstruction,
and regenerated by the admission of her
Senators and Observation-Disclosures they
may be-she is told she may lead a new and
better life. And 1t is a new life and q better
one, for it gives her new hope and new incen-
tive In loosening the shackles that have bound
her fair limbs so long. She now has the power
to shake off the sore stiffness that cramped
her in her chains; to slough away the de-
spondency and lethargy that would soon have
proven SO deadly, and to rise once more, in
her dignity and majesty, among thesovereign
States.
1t Is in her own hands to do this. II her
people rise with one accord and agree to
vote as one man on the third of November,
the voice of Alabama will be heard high in
the glad song of triumph that swells for
the victory of right and law from Maine to
Mexico. For the vote of Alabama must and
will be recorded. Even the most rabii radicals,
outside her borders, have not Jared to deny
that right; they have endorsed it by claiming
the votes of her eight electors for Grant and
Colfax. They have failed even to hint at her
exclusion on the plea that they do of Texas,
Virginia, and Mississippi.
There was, therefore, nothing left them but
to SO manipulate this vote as to Justify the
claim they had made Of it for their candidates.
This was left to the carpet-bag Solons at Mont
gomery, and we verify believe these wise men
have Overreached themselves. That they
have not done Soft we be mistaken-is not
their own fault, but that of our people who
refuse to register and to vote. We have
affirmed and reafirmed, and we now once
more repeat that it is not only the right OF
Alabama to vote, but her highest and most
sacred duty.
AS State OF the Union and in the Union,
her eight electoral votes will be received and
counted those eight votes may decide the
election for the Democratic candidates II cast
in their favor-against the Democratic candi-
dates il cast against them.
What will be the feeling of the State, what
the feeling of every man in it, if-when toe
late-it is shown that lukewarm, over-certain,
or hair-splitting Democrats have let the vote
of Alabama offset and nullify the hard-earned
but honest verdict of great, doubtful State