Smyrna times., 1896-11-18
KENT COUNTY ELECTION TTOUBLE.
Special Session of COnrt.

There will be O special session of the
Superior Court of Kent county to hear
argument on alternate writ of manda-
mus to show cause why the board of
canvass should not meet again and
make a recount of the votes, including
those polled in the hundred and
thrown out by the board at its session
last Thursday, The hearing will be at
Dover tomorrow at 10. 30 o'clock.
The papers necessary for the proper
conduct of mandamus were prepared
i'll Dover by James Pennewill, Beniah
Watson, w. 7. Smithers and Edward
Ridgely, all of the Kent county bar.
II. H. Ward and Walter H. Hayes
presented the papers to Chief Justice
Lore Thursday before the opening of
the afternoon session of court.
Judges Cullen and Grubb, who sit
upon the bench of the Kent county
court with Chief Justice Lore, imme-
diately hele a session, and it was the
unanimous opinion that special ses-
sion should be held.
The petition covers 113 typewriter
pages. 1t sets forth that the Board of
Canvass, or majority of it, refused to
canvass the full returns from the
county; that if it had done so as re-
quired by law the Union Republican
party would have had a majority in
the county; that the majority granted
illegal certificates to the Democratic
candidates, the certificates not having
been signed by all of the members of
the Board of Canvass, nor bv the
sheriff, who was "neither dead nor
absent. " The petition asked that the
court issue a rule to compel the sixteen
inspectors to show cause why thev
should not reassemble. count the re-
turns as made and issue certificates of
election in accordance with the same.
The length of the petition is due to
the fact that it was necessary to set
forth so many figures. Itwas first ne
cessary to make the petition one of the
twenty-six Union Republican candi-
dates against the sixteen inspectors OF
election who compose the Board of
Canvass for Kent county and to name
all of them.
IL was also necessary to specify that
the Union Republican candidates were
citizens of the county and state. and
then to show that they were qualified
to be candidates for the offices to which
they were elected. The petition also
gives the vote for each candidate on
the whole official ballot in each of the
sixteen districts of the county, and
also the totals for all of the districts.
All of this took space and the 113
pages are thus accounted for.
The case is believed to be the first
for which application for a special ses.
sion of the Superior Court was made in
one county and called in another
county. The law providing for such
special sessions of court has been in
force for number of years, but was
never used before.
The present contest has excited con.
siderable attention, as it is a new
one, both so far as regard law and
fact Had the Board of Canvass con.
sidered all of the returns and with the
sheriff signed one set of certificates,
no court could have overturned its de.
cision or questioned its action. In
this case, however, the board did not
consider the returns from the whole
county; the whole board did not sign
the certificates and neither did the
sheriff. The board has not yet com.
pleted its work and therefore it is be.
lieved that the court can reach them.
1t is not yet known who will defend
the Democrats.