Delaware gazette and state journal. (Wilmington, Del.) 1883-1902, 1889-01-10
A mockery of Popular Ruie,

IlHleS.
1t is common to hear New England sem
ators and representatives declaim against
the reconstructed statss because their
local governments are not Republican in
form, as required by the constitution /;
but during the last score of years the
only three states of the Union which have
persisted in anti Republican form Of gov
eminent are Rhode Island, Connecticut
and Delaware, and of these Delaware is
the least offender. Rhode Island, where
q property qualification for suffrage has
been applied to ell naturalized citizens,
aud thus DISTINGUISHED nearly one.third
the citizens of the state, has finally
amended her fundamental law, but was
careful not to allow IL to 60 into effect
until after the late Presidential election.
II required more than half century of
battle for Republican form of govern
ment in Rhode Island, including one
good-sized Dorr rebellion, but the wrong
has been corrected and little Rhody is ut
last able to look her sister states in the
face aud point to her free institutions.
Connecticut presents most ilagrant in.
stance of the veriest mockery of popular
will. There the old EDglieh rotten bor-
ough system is yet maintsined to perpet-
uate partisan power in defiance of the
people. Time aud again the voters of
Connecticut have elected governor and
other state officers only to see them re-
jeoted by the legislature that is packed
by rotten boroushs, and the defeated cam
didates installed in office. The oonstitu-
ton forbids the choice Of the people to
fill any state Office unless he has received
- 10 ~ n
then the rotten borough legislature elects
by rejecting the ohoics of the people.
And it is startling to note how this mock
cry of the popular will is planned and
executed. 1t lie done solely by food Of
rotten boroughs having from 100 to 80
votes each Of which elects as many rep.
resentatives as New Haven with her
IS 900 votes. Thus the town of Union
with 118 votes elects two representatives,
while the town of New Haven with 16, goo
votes elects only two representatives.
There are IA towns, beginning with New
Haven and ending with Bristol, which
poll an aggregate of nearly 1000 votes
and elect only 28 representatives, while
ITO towns, which poll an aggregate vote
OF $4,000, elect $40 representatives. It
is simply shameful mockery of every
feature of Republican government, and 1t
should be speedily overthrow. Della
ware, the much abused Bourbon state,
is paragon Of popular ,ule compared
with Connecticut. There Kent and Sus-
sex rule the State against New CASTLE, but
Kent and Sussex have more population,
as given in the last census, than New
Castle, aud there is at least semblance
OF popular rule but the fact remains
that New Castle, with nearly or now
probably quite one-hslf the population
of the state, elects but one third of the
senators and representatives The dit
ference between Connecticut and Della
ware is that in Connecticut $1,000 voters
elect as representatives and IS, 900 voters
elect 220, and in Delaware one half the
voters elect three senators and seven rep
resentatives and the other half elect SIX
senators and II representatives, It is
sorry Bourbonism in Delaware in this
evening of the nineteenth century, but
what sort of Bourbon darkness is 1t In
Connecticut