Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-01-08
ENFORCEMENT BEFORE AMENDMENT

The agitation in favor of a new constitu-
tional convention has taken the form of
bill providing for vote on that point at the
November election introduced yesterday by
Senator Robinson. 1t has chiefly made
itself apparent in the columns of journals
whose independence and sincerity is beyond
question, and whose arguments deserve to
be Judged on their merits. Still there are
many reasons why the necessity for such a
convention is still open to debate, and some
verv solid considerations on the other side.
The movement for convention took its
rise from the supposed necessity In order to
establish ballot reform. of repeating the bal
lot numbering clause of the Constitution in
the interest of the secrecy of the ballot. But
the bill which the Ballot Reform Asso-
citation has framed and sent into
the Legislature affords a prac-
ticable demonstration that this secrecy
can be practically maintained without
destroying the safeguard against the ballot
box substitution and stufing which the
present provision affords OF course election
officers might violate the provision requiring
the lists to be sealed before the vote is
counted; but they could do the same with
the provisions of the Australian law, pure
and simple; and detection and punishment
is hardly more likely in one case than in
the other We do not think that the cause
of ballot reform makes a constitutional
convention necessity.
The Philadelphia Record suggests other
matters on which it is desirable to have the
action of a constitutional convention, such
as an educational qualification for suffrage,
the requirement of a personal registration,
and the amendment of the provision that
''no elector shall be deprived of the privi-
Iege of voting by reason of his not being
registered" The first matter is one of such
importance that it can only be properly con-
sidered by itself.
The DISPATCH has always looked with
favor on the idea of an educational test; but
it recognizes clearly that the question of
limiting the suffrage can only be properly
discussed or fully decided when mad:
single issue, and voted for as a single
amendment to the Constitution. The other
two changes are presented BY the Record as
cure for the vice of padding the election
lists. But this raises the decided question,
first, whether the vice is due to these pro-
visions, and as we find it to be rife in cities
where personal registration is required, we
are led to the conclusion that unscrupulous
officials can pad the lists about as easily
under one system as the other; while there
is the further question whether the altera-
4. IS sl
door to other abuses without remedYing the
first one.
There is another consideration which
ought to have some weight in the popular
decision of this question. The present Con-
stitution, which was the product of some
of the brightest minds the State ever
produced, has been in force for nearly seven
teen years; but some of its important pro-
VISIONS have never had fair test. So far as
the Constitution has been enforced in good
faith, experience has shown its provisions to
be wise and beneficial. But the exigencies
of politics, the interests Of corporations and
the uncertainties of judicial construction
have brought about the remarkable result
that, after seventeen years, some OF the most
vital provisions of that instrument are still
unenforced. 1t is somewhat suggestive
point in this connection that the bill looking
toward a new convention is introduced BY
the very legislator who, in famous speech
against bill to prevent railroad discrimi-
nation some years ago, declared that he was
not ready to give his support in legislation
to the provisions of the Constitution under
which he held his seat
Apart from the possibility of body as
sembled under such auspices repeating the
salutary provisions of the Constitution
which regulate corporations, forbid special
legislation and restrain great number of
abuses that were notorious before its adop-
ton. the state of the case presents much
more urgent duty than that of tinkering with
the instrument; that is to start movement
for its enforcement as whole according to
its letter and spirit. When an opportunity
has been given for the public to learn by
experience what the effect will be of living
by the whole of that instrument, instead of
nullifying some portions of it, then the
work of amending it can be done intelli-
gently. Till then, it is better to enforce the
Constitution that we have than fly to others
that we know not Of