The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-09-11

lay action by congress until the session
expired by limitation on March 4. there
would have been no announcement Of the
result, and could have been no presiden-
methods. Samuel ]. Randall, who was
then speaker of the house, was once asked
by the writer what the Result would have
been had there been no declaration of the
result by congress that year.
cit is something too awful to contem-
plate" he said. II did not agree with
those who thought that Gen. Grant could
hold over until his successor qualified. The
presidents term is limited absolutely to
four years. There is no authority any
where for ordering q new election, and
had therei been one ordered lawfully.
who was to administer the govern
ment between the 4th of March
The government would have been simply
paralyzed. There would have been no
cabinet. and nothing short of some revo-
lutionary or ultra-constitutional step
would have given US government. Of
course the good sense of the American
people would have made it easier to solve
the problem, and yet it is dangerous
thing to rely upon popular sentiment in
emergencies like that"
Mr. Randall did not say that he was of
opinion that there should be constitu-
tional provision that the president should
hold over until his successor was qualified,
but he suggested that that might be the
only means of preventing headless inter
regnum if the emergencies here referred to
should arise.
Some of those statesmen who have
thought great deal about the machinery
of presidential election, both from the
legal and the popular point OF view,
regard it as grievously. clumsy, in
VOWED, expensive and containing
oIN IS
nearly year to elect president of the
United States, and takes the action of four
formal bodies. three of which are ordered
by law. and one, in some respects the
most important, by custom. The eau
cuses to elect delegates to national
convention are held in the early
spring of the year preceding inauguration,
The national conventions, which are
now As essential part of the machinery
as the meeting of the electoral college,
are held early in the summer. In
November the national election oc-
ours, its results are certified TO the
electoral colleges, which meet In the
various states in December, the eiecto-
raj colleges send on certified copies of
their votes to the president of the SEN
ate. and the two houses of congress
meet in midwinter and In their pres
ence the president of the senate counts
the returns from the electoral college and
declares as a result of them the election of
the successful candidates for president and
vice president. Nosuch detailed, expensive
and elaborate machinery for choosing
ruler has been known in the history of
republics. But there is only one remedy
for it. and that is by constitutional
amendment. Mr.. Conkiing used To say
that it had been found necessary to
amend the constitution once, SO that
new method of eecting presidents
and vice presidents could be secured, and
thought it likely that the time would
come, when the country was settled from
the Atlantic to the Pacific, when another
amendment would be found necessary
also E Jay EDWAgps