The Ottawa free trader. [volume] (Ottawa, Ill.) 1843-1916, 1875-10-02
MUNICIPAL REFORM.

Elk Senator Doolittle, of Wisconsin, was Sc
lectcd as the substitute for jeff Davis at the
Winnebago county fair, and delivered aspeech
certainly very different from what DAVIS
would PROBABLY have given them. Mr.. Doc
little is no farmer, and therefore wisely chose
q subject upon which he was better posted
than the best modes Of raising wheat corn,
cattle, rutabagaS or squashes For the last
malt dozen years the ex-senator has made
his home in Chicago, and being man of
close observation, as well as Of rigid integrity
and imbued with the noblest patriotic i'm.
pulses, the daily spectacle presented to him
in Chicago of the abuse of municipal poll
tics became a sore grief to him, and he nat
urally began to revolvc the conuhdrum
whether such evils, so great in their coHse-
quences and becoming so burdenseme, were
inevitable to popular government, or whelh'
er they were capable Of remedy, or at least OF
mitigation AS practlced in Chicago, uni
veisal suffrage was clearly farce-nay much
worse, "a grievous wrong and outrage Was
It indeed true, as some sage remarked fifty
years ago, that "Hhen cities attain to 10000
inhabitants, their people cease to be capable
of selfgovernment"
Mr.. Doolitte, upon the whole, after care.
fully revolving the subject, thinks at least the
worst of our municipal evils can be cured
without sacrificing our popular system. The
remedy he proposes is certainly somewhat
hpt lnnGs tho flcn nf n SpDsihlp
and practicable. His cure consists ~ in Sc
curing an honest vote, and % in making the
vote really representative. He proposes that
the city be divided into precincts so small
that the voters dwelling in each can meet IN
one hall or tent on election day; that election
days be made legal holidays, and voters be
required to attend the meeting and to vote; ;
that to guard against fraud, the name and
place of residence of each voter be written
upon his ballot, and that the same be public
ly read before it Is put into the ballOtboX;
and that challenged voter be required to
prove his qualifications by sufficient evidence
in the presence Of the assembly.
This our rural readers will perceive, is in
effect the introduction into the city system of
our town meetings, with the addition of the
old mea toce vote, which Illinois % years ago
discarded, and the very novel feature of com
pulsory suffrage
Mr.. Doolittle introduces another novel fea-
ture in his system, which may be called house.
hold suffrage. He would give one ballot to
every citizen and two ballots TO every citizen
who is the head Of u family. This plan, he
believes, would, in effect, give votes to Il class
now disfranchised. Women and children
are Interested in good government, but they
are powerless to secure it. Household sui
f-age would make their voice heard by per
hitting the householder, beside his own bal
lot, to cast one for the women and children of
his family.
While it may be doubted whether these
reforms" which would probably work well
enough in the country, are any better adapted
to the debased, brutal, purchasable material
that makes up so large proportion of the
voting material of cities, the plan may be
worth considering. Certainly the evils are
great enough to justify the trial Of any plan
which promises remedy or even slight
mitigation.