The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1878-12-12

1T ID ClhilDou VHhb Sliuto'"e' hhNiO p"A'
doing of honest voters In Massachusetts
alone than in all the Southern States to-
gether A letter from Massachusetts,,
published ia the N. Y. World, speaks
thus;
81 am Democrat, but, like Judge Abb
bott, did not vote for Gen. Butler Nor
did 1 for his Republican opponent. l
am glad on account of good money that
Butler was defeated, and yet | cannot
but condemn the way in which the de-
feat was accomplished. Ihave read your
comparison between South Carolina and
Massachusetts, bull ll-dozing" with salts
faction, but am satisfied you do not APP
preciate the real character of the violent
terrorism which the Republican leaders
in Massachusetts applied to voters VINO
were workingmen, and suspected OF par
tiaIity for Butler. Pistols we're not used,
nor red shirts, nor masks, nor any Ku'
Klnx machinery, but something much
more elIicacious was applied Every OF,
fee holder in Mass ichusetts denounced
Butler. The banks adminiiered AN ad'
monition' to any applicants for discounts
who sustained him; and the great factory
managers left no appliance untried to
frighlen their operatives away from hun
/ know of one town in which lives a rich
employer who had in his employ some
forty men, devoted to Butler, This ow-
ner, on election day, tooE them two by
two in his carriage to the polls, and there
made them vote under his own eye the
Republican ticket. There was a con
certed plan all over the State, under
, which mill managers terrified their en-
pIoyees away from Butler by threaten
ing to discharge them at the beginning
of long, cold winter"
We have known of such doings in at
least one other State than Massachusetts;
and when "bar'l O money" is added,
il is no wonder "hansome" Congress-
man is elected. The truth is, that it
matters not whether the vote was coerc-
ed by shotgun mode, or terrified by
the fear of non employment, and starva'
ton for himself and little ones. 1t is not
a free election in the sense contemplated
by our Constitution and laws. The New
York World thus comments;
"The contrivauces adopted systematic
ally in MassAGhusetts-we say System
atically," because the doing of similar
things in different portions Of the State,
on the same day, and by different per-
sons, for one common object, indicated a
system-in order to make voters cast
their votes otherwise than their own
| judgments dictated, were not the same as
those alleged to have been used in South
Carolina. Were they not every whit as
reprehensible? The single inquiry is this:
Was the voter coerced or terrified by any
method, either to vote otherwise than he
really wished, or not to vote at alP II
he was thus coerced or terrified, it is the
same thing precisely, in the sense of a
free election, whether the compulsion or
terror was exercised by shot gun or by
the fear Of starvation for himself and his
family. Differing conditions of Civliza-
ton may produce different methods, just
as one state of society may tolerate duels
and another state of society may toler-
ate the personal insolenCe which leads
to duels where duels are tolerated. In
| the mining districts of Nevada or Colo
RADIO, men have not the same way of en-
forcing a right or redressing a wrong as
they nave on Beacon Hill in Boston.
True freedom of elections implies the
perfect exercise of the free will of the
voter 10 that end we have written
ballot and in theory secret ballot. To
that end the bribery of voter is a crime
the offering of hospitality to voter in
the form of drink is forbidden, as Mr..
Madison discovered to his cost in the
crisis of the Revolution; courts of Justice
are closed, and judicial processes cannot
be served on election day; betting is de-
nounced, threatening language to voter
is prohibited, and the military are for
hidden to be stationed near the poll. In
the Eastern States the quiet terror that
factory superintendents, mill owners and
large employers can exercise over needy
Workingmen at the threshold of long,
hard winter, is at least as potential as
the more trough and ready" influences
which the Southern planter is charged
with employing. What would be the ef
feet in this State, in a close election if
Mr.. Vanderbilt and Mr.. Jewett passed
the world along their roads that DO EN-.
ployee who voted hard-money ticket
could be continued in serviceP Alike
under our system of liberties and that
which exists in England, it is most he
nious crime to interfere in any manner
with the exercise of the voters free will
and free judgment. But yet the thing is
done in England, and it will be done in
America. Tie methods may be differ
ent in England from those employed in
America, they may be different in South
Carolina from those used in MassaChu.
sets, but the motive and the result are
the same. The most gigantic and limit
less fraud in elections, since elections
were first held, was that which seated
Mr.. Hayes in the place to which Mr. Til.
den was elected, and the evil influence
of that political crime will infect, years
to come, our whole elective system. 1t
taught the tricky politicians anew trick.
A mn the cipher revelations have reliev
"a M, '1aves from anxiety lest the
10 south Tli, and Consy yess should use Mr.. Til
len to nusb him ous of the WhiteHouse.
Mr., HAYES is now free to l,,Ik incendiary |
1onsense about "a solid Sout2," just as
10 did before an election fraud injected
lim into the seat of Washington. Is 1t
n the interest of peace, order and pros
1erity that he should do thisP