The Portland daily press., 1891-02-06

The Haines registration bill, which hss
been favorably reported to the House, is
measure that is destined to be of much value
In purifying and Keeping pure the voting
lists OF our cities. To prove the need of it, IL
Is not necessary to show that the voting lists
OF cities have been manipulated In the past
In the interests of one party or the other
The fact that the correction of the voting list
may and frequently does, under our present
method, fall entirely into the han DIS of one
party is enough to discredit the present ar
rangement, and establish the need of a
change by which the voting lists will always
pass under the eye of both parties. This the
Haines bill secures, and for that reason it
will be an Improvement over the present
method. OF course no system can be devised
that will make fraud impossible, but under
the Haines measure fraud will be very diff
cult. The Republican State convention de
clared in favor of such legislation as would
tend to purity the ballot. The Haines bill
will have that tendency. Therefore it
should receive the support of the Republican
members of the legislature.
But how easy it would he to discredit this
measure by the tactics which are resorted to
to defeat the Australian ballot bill. Supp0s-
ing some Republican member of the legisla-
ture should rise in his seat and demand to
know what public call there was Tor this
measure, and when the reply came. as come
1t must, that there had been very little, sup
posing he should initiate the opponents Of
the Australian ballot and declare that
he should oppose 1t because he had
seen no public demand for 1t, would that
strike the majority Of the Republican MEM
bers as sufficient reason for eiusal to vote
for measure which would tend to
purify electionsP Or surprising some
other Republican member should rise
and demand to know when and where
under our present arrangement elections
in Maine cities, had failed to register
the popular will, after the manner of
the opponents Of the Australian ballot, and
because nobody could cite Case, he should
declare that he was for the retention of the
old system, would that strike the majority of
the Republicans as sufficient reason to vote
against measure calculated 10 redeem the
party pledge to enact such legislation as
would tend to purify the ballot? Or suppose
some other Republican member should OBJ
iect to the expense that the law would entail
upon the state, would that strike the ma
jority of his party as sufficient reason for
voting against the bill? But these are the
arguments, and substantially all of them,
that are offered against the Australian bill
There is not public demand for it, exclaims
one opponent, yet the public demand for it is a
hundred times greater than for the Haines
bill. Our present system has never failed to
correctly voice the will Of the people, exclaims
another, In face of the official declaration of
the Republican party few years since that
1t so far failed to do so that a Republican
majority Of six thousand was overthrown In
three days by bribery and intimidation IN
der the present electoral system. The Aus
tralian system will be expensive. exclaims an
other, in face of the fact that it has not proved
expensive In Massachusetts and cannot
appreciably affect the tax rate in this State
None OF these arguments would be tolerated
moment against the Haines bill, but they
are about all that are brought against the
Australian bill. Why should they be more
effective when applied to that?