The Wheeling daily register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1864-1878, 1870-02-11
The Contested Election Cnse.

The contested election case of RAIDER
Is. PUTNAM for d seat in the House as
delegate from the Clay and Nicholas
district was decided yesterday. The clos
ing argument was brief. Mr.. STANTON,
counsel for PUTNAM, sought and OBJ
tanned permission to submit some addi
tional authority on the question of the
sufliciency ofthe notice in the case, and
Mr. RICHARDSON, counsel for RAIDER,
closed the case in speech of balf an
hour. The previous question, called by
a friend of PUTNAM, cut off further
speech making, and then, by vote of
90 to p, the House ousted PUTNAM and
awarded the seat to RAIDER.
The question upon which the case
turned was this: Can the regis
trars defeat elections by refusing
to furnish lists of the voters! The
House decided the question in the mega.
tive. By this decision, a more emphat-
ic rebuke has been administered to the
authors of registration frauds, than
could have been administered by any
other act short of the repeal of the reg
istration law itself
Mr.. PUTNAM held his seat by virtue of
the Clay county returns alone. In Mich
olas county, the Board of Registration,
composed of his friends and acting at
his suggestion, refused to make out
books for more than one township, and
in that PUTNAM expected a majority.
But the people of Nicholas county, after
doing all in their power to secure regis.
tration books for the election and fail
ing. resolved to pursue the only course
left them, and hold an election
without books. At the election so held,
the same election officers presiding who
had been holding the elections for sew
eral years, no man was permitted to
vote who was not known to be regis
tered voter. RAIDER received q ma
jority Of the votes thus cast sufficient
to overbalance PUTNAMs majority in
Clay and still leave him margin sf forty
one. Being as influential with the Su-
pervisors as with the Board of registra-
tion, PUTNAM had the entire returns
from Nicholas ignored and took his seat,
as before stated, on the returns from
Clay only. A proceeding so insulting
to the people and so disgraceful to its
authors could not receive the sanction
of any respectable body of men. The
House discharged its duty to itself and
the people by overturning the whole
fraud and awarding the seat to the man
who was the choice of the majority.
| The course of the Legislature for the
last four or five years has rather been
to sanction these registration iniquities
than to rebuke them. The representa-
tives of the people have been regularly
rejected in contests. The representa-
tives Of the Boards of registration have
been regularly admitted. By the action
of the House yesterday this sort of thing
receives its quietus. The people are no
longer to be gagged by the illegal ac-
tion of registrars acting in the interest
of demagogues. And if hereafter these
and other officers shall attempt to over
ride the popular will; it is well settled
that their action will be reversed and
that the men of the peoples choice will
, be installed in the places to which they
are chosen. No more election outrages OF
I this sort, at least, will be permitted.
/, The fact that PUTNAM, who loses the
saeat in this contest, was the candidate