Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1895-09-20
HONEST ELECTIONS.

There will be good deal heard in Vir-
ginia for the next two months about honest
elections. Many men who are tricky
themselves will be calling for honest cleo
tions. Heelers who have been buying
votes for twenty years will be calling for
honest elections. The same men who
spent in Augusta county two years ago
more money than had been spent in the
county elections for ten years, will be
bawling for honest elections.
What is an honest election law?
When man has spent his life in accu-
mulating little property, and a law is
passed giving an illiterate negro who has
no interest in the community and no more
idea of what he is voting on than four
| year-old child, the right to vote on how
that property shall be taxed and what laws
shall govern it's owner, that is dishonest
election laU.
What is an honest election law?
The rule of the majority in elections is
honest. and right, When community Is
divided into 500 intelligent white men in
one party. and 100 intelligent white men
and 600 absolutely ignorant negroes In the
other party. the six hundred negroes Deihe
controlled and ruled by the one hundred
whites, then the minority Of one hundred
whites rules, and any election law that
makes that possible is dish onest electaom
IaU.
What is an honest election law
The Republicans the whole COM
bine against the Democracy may be put
down in that category-haye denounced
without stint the infamous Anderson
Mccormick law. They were perfectly
satisfied with the election law under which
Malone carried Virginia in 1881. There
was nothing Infamous about that. Ana
yet the only difference between that and
! the Anderson Nc Cormick law which fol
lowed it, was that the latter took the power
of appoin ting election officers out Of the
hands of the judiciary-where 1t should
never have been-and put it in the hands
of an Electoral Board. That was all there
was in it.
What is an honest election law ?
An honest election law is ems that pre-
vents vote buying, as our present law
does. 1t is no secret that for years in
| Virginia both parties have had to buy the
negro when they wanted him. The Re
publican party used to get him dead head
on the plea that it gave him his freedom,
but the Negro has gotten too smart fol
that now. The memory of Abraham Lin
coin is still cherished by the Negro, but to
affect his vote bis likeness must be on a
dollar bill. The Walton law has put an
end to that, for neither party is willing tf
put it's dollar bill behind the uncertain
curtain of the Walton ballot booth. 1t haf
done more for honesty in that respect thar
all other election laws in Virginia together
The ''honest election law' that Gen
Malone and his colaborers want is one thai
will count every Negro vote as against thu
Democratic party. A bill that does not dt
this will never he ''honegt' to them. But
in the matter of honesty they are begin
ming at the wrong end. An honest election
law that provides for the casting anG
counting of purchasable and corrupt
vote. is beginning at tho wrong place
| The substitution for the w alton law Of thu
Petersburg bill by which the old times, witt
long lines of bought Negro voters bought
by both opposing parties waiting to b.
polled for Their purchaser, will be restored
is very wide of giving the people Of Vir
GINA an honest election law.