Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-05-04
THE MC0MAS IDEA.
His Anti-Gerrymandering Bill Final
ly Reported to Congress.
A WARM ARGUMENT IN ITSFAVOR.
The Democratic Minority Bitterly Attacks
the Measure.
ONE REPUBLICAN ENTERS A PROTEST

WASHINGTON, May 3-Representative
McComas, of Mary land, to-day reported to
the House from the Committee on Election
of President and Vice President and Repre-
sentatives in Congress, his bill to prevent
gerrymandering. The report is long, and
includes an elaborate review and discussion
of the constitutional questions involved. 1t
says:
THE country grows more anxious to Sc
cure fair elections. Congress is justly urged
to pass national election laws to guarantee
q fair voting, counting and return of the
election Of Congressman In States hostile
to the exercise of the suffrage by colored
citizens, enforcement of such laws is diff.
cult indeed. The subject of a national
election law is involved in the negro. This
anti-gerrymandering bill may be ef-
fective in the white States where pow
erful minorities of white voters are to-day
suppressed by shameful gerrymandering.
JUST ONE INSTANCE.
''At the last election for Congressman in
Indiana, for instance, the majority vote for
Congressman elected three Representatives,
but the minority vote for Congressman
elected ten Representatives. Such gerry
Wandering is a crime against the general
Government and the people of the whole
nation. This bill will at least compe. rep
resentation of the suppressed white minority
in the white States. 1t will check reckless
gerrymandering in the States OF the black
belt and make it easier for Representatives
elected therein to obtain eertifcation of
election. 1t will respect equally States
rights and the rights OF the Q nited States.
1T permits States to continue to make
regulations for the election of Congressman,
but warns the States that national Consti-
tuition has been adopted establishing a real
and not a shadowy government, a sover-
eighty OF the people reposed in an Execu-
tive and Congress, and that the Congress
will exercise its power TO make or alter the
State regulations of time. place and manner
of holding elections for Representatives in
Congress, to secure districts more compact
as to territory, more fstable in duration, and
to secure greater equality OF population
behind the Representatives in Congress.
These things the States have failed to do"
THE MINORITY REPORT.
Mr.. Tucker, of Virginia, submitted the
report Of the minority. After bitter criti-
cism OF the bill, it SAYS: ''In this day the
spirit of reform is restive. 1t cannot wait.
1t would break down precedents because
bhey are olu, anu sancIlon Suggestions OF
radicalism because they are new. 1t would
take from States the privilege of arranging
their own Congressional districts as each
might think best for its own people, and
assigns that right to Congress, against rea-
son, precedent and the Constitution itself,
1t would uproot the laws of sovereign States
without cause, and supplant them with the
unconstitutional enactments of a partisan /
Congress.
'It would break down the representative |
principle In our government by placing |
power in the hands of the representative for |