The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1876-06-09
ELECTION DAY.

ELECTION DAY.
Monday, June 5th, 1876, dawneu as
peacefully and as quietly as had its few
predecessors in the month of roses, and
with not more portent in its aspect.
No signing breezes repeated the signing
breath Of candidates who, with heroism
worthy better cause, sought, from mo-
tives purely disinterested, to spend the
next two years of their lives in the
service of an ungrateful commonwealth.
The people of the metropolis, includ-
ing candidates, voters, and women, were
early astir. Indeed, it is scarcely to be
supposed that the first class had pressed
even an uneasy pillow for many pre-
ceding nights, while the second must be
early at the voting place, and the
third, though not popularity supposed to
know anything about politics, must do
their part toward giving to the sover-
eigns their breakfast, brushing the lint
from their coats, etc., etc., for were not
these their proxies, and are not women
anxious for their sham representatives
not to be all sham?
Express wagons, carriages, and vehi-
cles of every sort, bearing in conspicuous
letters the names of this aud that as
pirant for office, logged through the
highways and byways of the city, Civ
ing free rides land only politicians know
what else) to any lord of creation, how
ever ignorant or depraved, masculine
was the only qualification), who could
be induced to vote in the interests of
the party in which that special hack
was rnn. Now it was a sturdy, un-
kempt son of Erin, who lolled back
upon the cushions of an elegant ba-
rouche, with surprised glances at his
surroundings, and contemptuous ones
at the women whom he might happen
to pass on his way to the ballot-box to
say who should be sent to the State
Legislature to grant or abridge their
rights, and make laws to govern them.
Again, it was "colored fellow-citizenu
who found himself taking a rapid ride
at the expense of politicians, who, for
forgetful alike of odor and color, grew
obsequious as they solicited his vote.
Now a man, halt and almost blind, who
could not shoulder the musket, which
is declared to be inseparable from the
ballot, if the existence of the nation de-
pended upon it, was assisted to alight,
and tenderly supported to the mystic
box which is supposed to enclose the
wishes of free men, and, at the bidding
ofanother, gave his name, and, "with his
old, decrepit, withered hand that palsy
shook" deposited a ballot which it were
a fraud to call his own. Good men and
true elbowed their way anon through
the motley crowd of the ''unwashed'-
this is to be literally interpretated here
who congregated in groups, rendering
the air vocal with vociferations concern
ing the degraded Chinese" and fetid
with exhalations of tobacco and whisky,
consoling themselves perchance by the
reflection that, at all events, the women
belonged to a lower class whom they
could yet rule. Saloons, in obedience (9)
to law, stood with main entrances care
fully and discreetly closed, albeit their
side doors and "sneak entrances were
constantly thronged. Election "dodg-
ers," appealing to prejudices of the
masses, displayed exaggerated senti-
ments in exaggerated type on every
available corner. "From morn till
noon, from noon to dewy eve," these,
and kindred scenes and devices were
witnessed until night drew over this
farce of freedom, illy-enacted, her SOM
ber mantle, sheltering alike feverish,
disappointed, or successful aspirants,
intelligent voters, ignorant libels upon
masculine humanity, dead drunks, and
women who, in shame and humilia-
ton, had seen the farce enacted.