Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-06-30
FEDERAL ELECTION LAWS.

FEDERAL ELECTION LAWS.
The Constitution clearly gives Congress
the power to pass laws to conserve the
purity, honesty and freedom of elections
involving the selection of Federal officials.
If it did not do SO the whole system would
be exposed to the vicious influences of
constituencies political schemers in the
several States. 1t remains, then, that the
only question involved in the bill on cleo
lions now before Congress is the wisdom
OF particular measure, or of the several
propositions to insure full, free and fair
elections in Congressional districts. As a
matter of fact it is known that in the abb
sence of a proper Federal election law,
there are parts where an impartial method
is never employed to ascertain the will of
the people. There are other sections
where the true vote is either suppressed,
or, after being cast, is manipulated. In
those places local laws are powerless to
prevent fraud and repression in elections,
and therefore the necessity arises for the
General Government providing, as the
Constitution authorizes it to do, for the
fair, free conduct of elections in which
congressman are chosen.
The bill now before Congress does not
permit any interference by Federal officers
with any election; the Supervisors the
Federal Government is to appoint are not
to act SO as to influence the vote of any
man; they do no more than see to it that
no legal voter is deprived of his right at
the ballot-box to vote for a candidate for
Congress; that the deposit and counting of
the ballots are honestly conducted, and
that the returns are not tempered with.
The purpose of the bill is, therefore, in
the interest of good government and free
and fair ballot. Nevertheless the Demo-
cratic press, notably that wing of it that is
Southern, manifests great Indignation that
the Congress of the nation should have the
temerity to interfere to the extent of in
surfing fair play, the Democracy claiming
that any care by Congress over elections
of any class is an infringement of the
right of the people to conduct elections
free from interference by other than State
laws; that all such laws tend to shear in
dividual liberty and to dangerously con-
centrate power in the General Govern
ment.
So far as infringing personal liberty is
concerned, that is mere rhetoric and gush.
The Federal law, on the contrary, protects
the ballot-box from manipulation and the
voter from intimidation and fraud. When
Federal officers are chosen all the people
of all the States have an interest, direct
and positive, in every such election. That
interest can be represented at the polls
only by the Federal Government, and
hence the proposition to send Supervisors
of Elections to every polling booth to see
to it that no citizen is deprived of the
right to vote freely, without intimidation
and under exemption from any manner OF
fear
The friend of honest elections has
nothing to fear from Federal super
vision; it is the man who wants free
play to manipulate ballot-boxes who is
loudest in his denunciation. There is a
large class however, of Democrats who
honestly think that any supervision of a
Federal election by Federal agent is a
dangerous encrocchment by Federal power
But, as we have said, such power as Con-
gress proposes to exercise is expressly con-
ferred upon it by the Constitution. 1t is
therefore, no assumption, nor is it anything
new. 1t was contemplated by the founders
of the Government, and under that express
provision, and under laws that have been
in operation by virtue Of it the nation has
waxed stronger and the rights of the peo-
pie have not been shorn. Our friends, the
Democrats, are alarmists-that is ALL They
always were obstructionists; they objected
to and fought the homestead laws, the
presumption laws, and about all progressive
propositions the Government has ever
adopted, and their opposition to method:
of insuring fair, Free full elections and
honest counts in cases where Federal off
GERS are voted for, is not surprising. Fed
eral encroachment is their ever-preseni
ghost, and keeps them in constant per-
splration.