The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1879-04-30
TERMS $500 PER ANNUM, IN ADVANCE.
ious act, amended as it now stands, and put II
on its passage. Was it not so?

ious act, amended as it now stands, and put 1t
on its passage, Was it not so?
Mr.. Allison, Yes, sir.
1850, was not, as the honorable Senator from
| iIlinols stated, war measure, to operate only
10 time OF war; it was passed in 1865, passed
%nsn Grant was tightening the coils around
;StnMonu' n;nt' passed when sherman, everywhere
conquering legions from the mountains to the
sea- IL was passed when the rebellion was in
The very article OF death. 10 less than sixty
Gays the confederacy as military fact bad be-
come vanished dream. No, sir, it was passed
at the end OF great war, and passed to put
Dridie on permission and power which had
gone unchecked for thrse-quarters of Q century
during which statesmen had lived, for there
were brave men before Agamemnon. It was
meant 10 be, 1t was said to be, and 1t is a mere
check 1t Furnishes ordering troops to approach
the polls except that when the order is for a
lawful purpose 1t is not included.
Does that, ask the honorable Senator from
Illinois, confer authority upon any body? Take
an an analogous case. Here is a statute-the
books of both hemispheres bristls with theu,-
denouncing homicide. What do they declare?
Ine Klllng Oh a human being with prepense
aforethought, shall be murder; but they except
or the court interpUlats3 into as an exception,
the act OF sheriff in executing criminal.
That act shall not be punished. Did any law
yer ever hear that under statute of that sort
anybody ever hear that If statute punished an
act and said except it be lawfully doue," that
statute furnished the authority for doing it, or
had any possible effect save only to say that
when lawfully done, when authority otherwise
existed to do 1t, 1t should not be held punisha-
blef A sheriff must have death warrant of q
competent tribunal, and an express enabling
statute when be proceeds to deprive q human
being OF life; without that he would be a mur-
derer, just as much under a statute excepting
lawful execution from punishment as homI-
cldes, as without such q statute. So when q
statute declares that troops shall be punished IL
y tney act except in given condition of things,
they must still be authorized, they must have
authority on which to act as much as the sher-
III must have authority on which to execute
Again, this act forbids civil officers to have
soldiers or armed men not soldiers, at the polls
excep 1t be necessary TO Quell violence The
amendment proposes to punish civil officers for
trying 10 subdue rioters or mobs by soldiers or
oy calling upon men not soldiers II they are
armed In any way; and this, we are told. Is to
subordinate the military to the civil authori-
tyf
Again, the act as it stands, forbids, except ir
the case for which there may be authority, the
presence of troops at the "Dlace" at which an
election Is to be held. What does "plsce"
mean? l ask emphsticslly what does "plaoe''
mean? The honorable Senator from Delaware
cited the other day at great length an instance
10 which troops had been present in The city of
New York within the meaning of this act,
every pollng-place; not allowed to go, even one
at time, to any polling place for any purpose
whatever. Under this Interpretation f'place"
must bs construed to mean a whole city or a
township, and under the proposed amendment
so construed on day when election is held
every soldier must be banished from the whole
Island OF Manhattan, and never allowed TO re-
turn during the day even though the entire city
should be wrapped in flames or sacked BY
mobs.
Again, the act of 1866 forbids the presence of
soldiers save only when necessary Ito preserve
the peace. My honorable friend from Connec-
ticut smiles
Mr. Eaton. do. Necessity is the plea Of
tyrants.
Mr.. !Conkling. That is the LAWYERS smile.
My honorable friend knows as well as I know
we do not differ-that a statute providing
tnat tning may De done when necessary, COM
mits to the discretion of somebody to Judge Of
that necessity. No doubt of il. No doubt the
discretion may be abused. All human discre-
tlon has been abused since the morning OF time.
The governor Of every State may abuse similar
discretion every day in the year; so may every
sheriff, mayor, and constable. The President
may mistake or abuse the discretion which
calls for his judgment; he may do it under ott-
er statutes and provisions every other day in
thd three hundred and sixty-fve. What is
there, in Gods name what is there In Repnb-
lie operating by universal suffrage and gov
erned by msjorties which should pick ous cleo
tion day and hand that over q prey to uuchal-
ie2ged ruin snism, brutality and disorder?
Connected with the amendment we
are now. considering and a part of
1t Is the act for protecting and
regulating national elections. That act
applies to cities of twenty Thousand or more in-
habitants. 1t provides that two persons may
be appointed by the court, not to act as over
seers but as supervisors of registration, voting
and counting at national elections. One is to
be Democrat, one Republican. That is to
prevent either side having advantage over the
other. In rural regions with sparse popula-
tlons, no provision is made. There, as a rule
all voters are known to each other; there the
danger ofimobs and tumults Is comparatively
slight. In the large cities the case is different
There these two supervisors are to see fair play;
tnat IS the whole of it. They have no powers,
nor nave the deputy marshals any power not
from time 1mmemcrial and from necessity re-
posed IN all the States, as far as know, in the
inspectors OF elections. read the provision as
IL stands In my own State and ask the Senate
to mark what sort of power It confers on every
inspector of election:
Ifany person shall .oiIftliy diso6ey any lasss.1
shall wifully and without lawful authority. OBJ,
sruct hinder or delay any eector on his way 10 any
poll where an election shall be held, or assist in such
judged guilty OF q misdemeanor, and be fined in a
sum not exceeding $3.50, and may be i0prsoned, In
the discretion OF the court, for more tnan six
months.
All these inspectors under this act are such
"p0tentates and powers" that any man who
dares to dlsobey their commands is to be pur-
ished, and vet the sensbiities of the gifted
and ardent Senator from, Indiana Mr.. Voor-
heesl palpitated with indignant emotion when
he thought of youth and old age meeting at the
polls and voting, with two persons, one Demo-
crat and one Republican looking right at them
when they did IL; looking on to see that the re-
ceiver OF ballots did not destroy or change them
but put them in the box, aud after ward to sea
that the ballots were honestly coun ted after
youth ana age had gone home to supper
N a re- nj hat nrAa M al
up my mind that on such an occasion youth
and age after the days titful struggle might
sleep we'll.
The election law came in to correct abuses
which reached their climax in 1868 10 the city
of New York. In that year in the State of New
York the Republican candidate for governor
was elected; the Democratic candidate was
counted in. Members of the Legislature were
fraudulenty seated. The election was q bar
barous burlesque. Many Thousand forged nat.
urslization papers were issued; some Of them
were white and some were coffee-colored. The
same witnesses purp0rted to attest hundreds
aud thousands Of naturalization sffidavts, and
the siupendous fraud of the whole thing was
and is open secret. Some of these naturali-
zation papers were sent TO other States. So
plenty were they that some of them were sent
TO Germany, and Germans who had never left
their country claimed exemption from the Ger
man draft for soldiers in the Fraoco-Prossian
war because they wereI nstura lied American
citizens! Laughter
Ihe holoers VI these papers voted by thous.
ands, and have heard IL said in this debate
that Judge Blstchford had decided that these
papers are legal Never. L see the Senator
from West Virginia Mr.. Hereford nod. He
does not nod very forcibly, but he mods enough
TO induce me to stop aud read from the judg-
ment of Judge Blatchford. Judge Blatcoford
passed upon case m m4de-lawyers will UNDER
stand what that is-presenting pure question
Of law. What was the question? Whether
certain papers on deposit or in file In court In
and of themselves, assuming their verify, as
suming that they were genuine, constituted
record in the eye Of the law. There was no
question tried or decided whether they were
forged or not; 20 question whether they fraudu-
lent or not; no question whether they had been
signed as some of them had been, with the
name of Offi GERS on their face who never were
elected until long after the paper was issued;
but on the naked que stion presented to him,
Judge Blatchford spoke. He refers to another
case in which the same question has been pre-
sented, and says;
The sole ground Of such application was that the
validity of the admission OF the party to citizenship
disputed on the allegation that there was no
legal record of the judgment admitting him to citi
zenship,-
Why? ask the Senate to mark.
Ca hat tba of n