Arizona republican., 1904-02-16
Admitted His Election Was
 Accomplished by Fraud
hE WAS NOT A PARTY
Absolved by the Committee on the Contest and Pronounced by Those Who KnoM Him as Too Honest to Profit by Sn Unlawful Act.

Washington D. C., Feb. 15.-In voluntarily relinquishing his seat as 2 member of the house of representa- tives. MT. .Shafroth of the First Dis trict of Colorado, furnished a profound 1 sensation during the forty minutes session today. The manly and earnest | words of the Colorado member fairly | took the breath of the house as he proceeded to put the first case on record in that body where a member | gave up his seat, acknowledging that | his election had been tainted by fraud. |
 Proceeding under personal privilege ! recognition. MT. Shafroth reliTquished | his seat in favor e Robt. w Bonynge. | the republican contestant for the seat!
 MT. Olmsted. chairman of the com 1 mittee before which the case :s pend iiig followed with a most compliment tary statement as to the attitude MT. Shafroth had persued throughout the investigation. This investigation, he said, had shown fraudulent votes but it also had sfown that MT. Shafroth was in no way personally responsible for the condition and that the fraud had not been committed for his benefit, his vote being but an incident in tie scheme. As the matter was a complete surprise to the committee, MT. Olm- sted said no resolution seating Mr. Bonynge h@d been prepared. After an interval in which a bill was passed ratifying an amendment to an agree mcnt with the Indians located on the Grand Ronde reservation of Oregon, | MT. Olmsted presented a~formal reso- Iution unseating Shafroth and seating | Bonyngc.
 MT. Shafroth's statement was as fol- lows:
 "Mr. Speaker. I rise 10 q question 1 of raIsonal privilege. Ir the contested l election case of Robert w. Bonynge against John r. Shafroth it was stipu- lated and agreed by contestant and contestee that the ballots cast at the | election in the twenty ninth contested precincts. should be brought before he committee on elections of this house and opened for the first time within the presence of its members The ballots were those cast, at the
 general election of 1902 for st:lte otf'- cers and representatives in congress- | The object was that the original ar rangement. form and condition of bal lots should be seen first by the com mittee. The ballots were shipped 10
 the clerk of the house Of representa- lives ar the joint expense of congress,
 the contestant and contestce.
 At the first meeting of the commit
 tee for a hearing of the case, the bal
 lots were presented for inspection. A
 subcommittee was appointed to aS-
 certain how many illegal ballots were
 contained therein. It was agreed that
 in order to facilitate their work the
 rv~r. gfrl h.
 committee opened the ballots from
 three precincts and, finding it took
 one week to examine them asked the
 house for authority to employ an cN-
 pert, which was graEteI. Since that
 time. the expert has been examining
 the. ballots, and On Thursday last. he
 made his repor- to the committee. I he
 committee then ordered that the par
 ties should have one weeks time III
 which to examine the ballots and then, if either of us desired to send to the
 expert for the purpose ot examining
 them, we should have that privilege
 After that, the case was to be set los
 argument before the committee.
 "On Thursday afternoon l com
 menced examining the ballots and coll tinued doing so through Friday ano Saturday. I do not believe that 2,'9z a illegal votes were cast (that being the
 majority as returned) yet my exam ination discloses the fact that the as
 surance which I had received as tt ; the regularity of the votes in many oI the precincts was not true, and there
 were illegal votes therein, which talnt- ed the polls and the polls so tainted gave me d greater plurality than m! returned majority.
 5 That fact was a bitter disappolnt- nent to me. but it was nevertheless: true. The law is that when poll l' tainted bv fraud. and it is impossible J to purge the poll of fraudulent votes e the votes Jf the entire precinct, lcga d or illegal. must be thrown out. Tn I committee has given me every oppof' s tunitv to ascertain these illegal votes \ so as to save the valid vote in those precincts. Until I saw the ballots iaS H Thursday. I thought the illegal Vot' q could be detected and scratched iron the legal vote. but I must confess E! t inspection has convinced me, 1t IS m F possible to do so in this case.
 < .''The case being as I have stated q and the number of precincts tainted containing majorities for me greate \ than my returned majority, l mus q say that if I were a judge upon th' H bench considering this case, l woulC < be compelled to find against myself and though the vote in the con tested precincts aggregatse les a than one tenth of the vote in the con S gressional district, I would be compel < led to find that according to law, MT a Bonynge is entitled to the seat.
 II did my best to have an homes ! election My law partner, with my ap provaI, organized a citizens committe
 composed of both republicans ant . democrats, who desired a fair cleo
 ticn. The headquarters of that com
 mittee, as shown by evidence in tn
 case. was in the law offices of Rogers
 Shafroth & Gregg, Denver.
 II have always been in favor O
 pure politics, and when the test is ap
 piled to an election, where I was voteC