Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1889-04-07
RHODE ISLAND METHODS.

Rhode Island is a small State, bat the
result of the election there last week,
which TIE Democrats won, is Of peculiar
signifcsnce 1t Is the first State to nold
an election since the late national Repubii-
can victory. and it has for the first time
admitted its large foreign bonn population
TO equality in the suffrage. Though a
Democratic success, the peculiar laws o.
Rhode Island deprive the successful party
Of share Of the fruits OF it. In Rhode
Island and Connecticut, States still bound
by the laws Of by gone ard bigoted gen.
Grafton, it rsq7ires a majority Of all the
votes cast 70 elect, ard in case no ore has
a majority, the Legislature decides the
election by joint ballot.
In the last legislature, tie Democrats
had six Senator's and ten Representatives
Nov they have eleven Senators and thirty
fo1r Representatives, while four Senatorial
and twelve Representative elections must
he held over again because nobody had
majority Already the Democrats have
secured a majority in ;he House, and II
they car elect seven of the sixteen mem
bers remaining to be elected they will Sc
cure a msi rity on the int ballot, and
he able to elec. their Governor, whom
the latest returns show TO have a
plurality Of 900, and ether State
officers wbo fn 4 few votes short of
a N. i5tity over all. and so failed OF eleo-
ton by the people Saould the Republi-
cans elect ten Of the sixteen NEGLECTED
members. they would have one m ilrity
on i1;at ballot, and would then elect Mr..
LADD Governor, though ne received but
Is 952 woes against %. 296 cast for other
candidates FOR the same offie The Demo
Gratis capno, possibly gain the Senate,
aud will therefore no. be able TO call
Constitutional Convention, as they have
6een trying {, do fer 40 years past. Tbs
Senate is 'gerrymandered" in way to
make ordinary "gerrymanders' hide their
diminished iads Each town and city N
the State has one Senator, and no more.
with one-third the population
Of the State aud several thousand Demo
cratic majority, has but one while towns
Of 500 population have the same. The
State is really governed by the small
town.-she same towns which Just 100
years ago vote on the Constitution of the
United States at their town meetings and
rejected il by an overwhelming majority.
TIE small back towns and not the cities,
OF Rhode Island have preserved limited
Suffrage, majority elections, and other
antiquated absurdities.
The psculiar Limitation which required
.creiglbOrn c,tiz rs to own real estate be-
tore rhey could vote was done away with
b. q coast utional amendment adopted
last year, and the newly-admitted voters
cast thei7 fl st votes Wednesday. Evil
IDENTIFY they voted with the ID mocrats.
By tee help Of their votes and the Ballot
Reform lsw, which has been passed, but
mas NOT vet taken effect, Rhode Island is
likely to b. hereafter Democratic State,
making, with Connecticut, an entering
wedge that viii rend r publican New En-
elln1 S7Urder
TIE question which split the Rhode Is
lard Republicans this year was that of re
admitting the Prohibition constitutional
am,udment to popular voc. It took eff
&c. il 1ss6 AID t1e people, except few
eve already heartily tired Of it.
The new / .sllturs, which will assemble
at Newport ia Jane, VIII iose no time in
p-oviiing for its e-submission-probably
81, a special Gle lion, which viii he the first
State election ever held in this country
under the "A tralan BaiOt Reform sys
ZEN.