Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1893-08-22
POPULAR ELECTIONS.
THE STEADY GROWTH OF INTEREST
IN STATE ELECTIONS.

Lessons L hat May BE Drawn From the New
York State and National Elections-rbe
Percentage of Voters to the Population
Greater In the Country.
A comparison of the election returns
at the end of the last century, about the
time of the adoption of the constitution
OF the United States, with the returns
Tor the last presidential election, shows
how widely the suffrage has extended in
the United States. In Massachusetts,
between ITS and 1894, the proportion of
votes cast to the population varied from
to per cent. In several counties of
| the state of New York there were cast at
the election of 1892 almost one-third az
many votes as there were inhabitants.
1t is the habit of many people to take
1t for granted that the earlier institu-
! lions of the United States were moro
| democratic than the present ones. and
that the tendency of these times is TO
| put the political power in the hands of a
rev men and to take it away from the
| multitude. No such theory is borne out
by the election returns. At one of the
! most holly contested elections in Virgin
Ia, when Chief Justice Marshall's father
was candidate for membership in the
| house OF burgesses, or what would cor
respond to assemblyman here, there was
| only one vote cast to every 10 inhabit-
| ants. ratio smaller than that cast in
| any county in this state for great many
years. There was property qualifica-
| tlon for electors in this contest, and it
was frequently the case that the voting,
instead of being by secret ballot, was
| viva voce. There were so few electors
that they would all come together on
election day, and their names would be
called, every man naming his choice.
With all the talk about the large vote
of the city of New York and the power
of its majorities to settle the result in the
state, II is somewhat contradictory that
the election figures should show that
New York has the smallest ratio of voters
to lnha oitants-less than half as large as
the ratio in many of the rural counties.
Brooklyn comes next and Buffalo third.
Throughout the state it is general that
| the Democratic counties cast fewer votes
to the number Of their inhabitants than
the Republican counties. In New York
the number of inhabitants to each voter
is Csc. in Kings 5.95 and in Erie 500,
while in Cortlandt and Otsego the ratio
is 3.1l to /; SIG in Yates, $50 in Gene
see, 1888 in Delaware, 3.3J in Allegany,
1928 in Madison, 1857 in Ontario 3.22 in
st. Lawrence. This shows a ratio twice
as large i'll New York and almost twice
as large in Brooklyn and Buffalo as in
the rural counties
| There are two main reasons to account
for this. One is the difference in the
election laws in the cities and III the
| counties, and the other is the difference
in the character of the population. 1t
cannot be a difference in politics, for
Schoharie, one of the few rural Demo-
cratic counties, shows ratio of g. Is, and
Greene, another Democratic county, has
a ratio of 1856. The percentage of voters
is lower in the cities than in the rural
districts. The two counties of Science
tady and Schoharie are Democratic and
contiguous. Schoharie is purely agri-
cultural county, while a great part of
the population of Schenectady county is
in Schenectady, which is a fourishing
little city. Schenectady has 5000 more
population than Schoharie, but it casts
several hundred fewer votes, and there Is
difference of third in their ratios
| One reason for the high ratios in New
York, Brooklyn and Buffalo is the large
number of aliens in those cities. The
aliens count in the population, but they
do not count in the number of voters.
According to the state census New Yorks
/ Lot 20 Nd ha
ratio in Buffalo is almost as high.
Another thing is the difference in cleo
ton laws. In the cities a man has to go
to tie polling place twice to vote-once
to register and once to cast his ballot. In
the country he has to go only once and
that time to vote. His name may be put
on tie registration list by his friends.
A comparison of these returns with the
election returns at the time of the Revo-
lutionary war and the adoption of the
cons tuition shows that political inter
est is increasing every year, and that the
percentage of those who participate in
elections is also increasing. In Massa-
chusetts toward the close of the last CEN
fury, when discussions respecting the
federal constitution were going on and
when there had been an actual rebellion
in one part of the state, not over 6 per
cent of the population voted, although
the census of those days shows that about
three times that percentage of men were
emit led to vote In New York state at
the last election the census and registra-
tions lists were almost identical in many
districts and there We're some districts
where there were more votes cast than
the census showed of residents in the dis
tric5 in the spring when the census was
taken.
II may be that to the rich men and
men engrossed in the management Of
large business affairs politics and politi-
cal matters are not relatively SO impor-
tan5 as they were when the United States