The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1893-02-01
The Ignorant Democrat.

There has been some controversy
among those interested in the Australian
ballot law as to which is the better system
of printing names-the original Australian
which groups the names by offices, or
the Belgian, which groups the names by
political parties. Massachusetts, adopted
the Australian and Indiana the Belgian
system. 1t now appears there was an OBJ
ject in the action OF Massachusetts, and
the Boston Herald explains il thus:
When this form OF voting was proposed
ii was received with peculiar favor by the
republican majority in the general court.
because IL was supposed it would have q
demOralIzing effect upon the rank and file
of the democracy, the assumption being
that, while under our somewhat lax sys-
tenn of registration mems names were
placed upon the voting lists whose powers
to read and write were open to strong
suspicion, these individuals. numerous in
the aggregate, when confronted with q
ballot which il would be necessary for
them to read in order to vote Alright. would
quickly become confused and would
either not mark at all. or, if they marked,
would be quite as likely 10 favor the re.
publican as the democratic candidates.
The republican theory was that the
celebrated Ignorance of democratic voters
would bring about this result. The dem
ocrats of Massachusetts belong chiefly to
1.-The lower classes" and were not sup
posed to be able to read and write. just as
they are in common republican opinion
in other parts of the country. But for
some reason the scheme did not work
The Herald says:
In the vote of the last three elections
the results so confidently hoped for have
hardly been realized. The Australian bal
lot system has proved an effective check
upon intimidation but either the average
of intelligence among the rank and file OF
the democracy is higher than il was as
sumed to be or the average OF intelligence
among the rank and file of the republican
party is much lower than it was assumed
TO be, for when put to the test il is found
that one party is quite as liable 10 make
mistakes as the other. and that one ticket
suffers in about the same proportion as
the other from failure of the electors TO
vote for all of the party candidates.
Two years ago the proposition was
made that the electors should be given
the option of voting either for each candi-
date separately, or of marking with one
stroke of the pencil for the entire party
ticket. This proposition was at the same
time vigorously opposed by the republic
ans in the legislature. who believed that
il was device on the part OF the democ-
racy to increase their party strength. But
We risk little in SAYING that If such q
proposition Was brought forward this year
it would meet with a very considerable
amount OF republican support, prominent
members of that party having said that
under such conditions it is obvious that
Mr.. Russell would not have been chosen
as governor of this state.
Apparently the result in Massachusetts
has been much as it was found in Indiana
When the law was tried the men who hsC
the most trouble and made the most mis-
takes were the ones who were fairly edu-
Gated and thought they knew too much
to accept information. Now that Massa-
chusetts has learned that the Ignorant
democrat" votes Just tho same way under
any system, it may very reasonably adopt
the more convenient and rapid plan oil
Indiana.