Arizona republican., 1905-02-10
The Reform rlost Needed.

tions, introduced by President Hunt of
the council, is designed to reduce fraud
and corruption at primaries to min
imum. and it should pass. 1t will be
a long step toward purifying the bal
lot
The legislature must go deeper. how
ever, in order to cure the evils Of our
electoral system. Nothing is needed so
much as an educational qualification for
voters. No person should be permitted
to vote in Arizona unless he can read
a paragraph of simple English
The necessity of such law is admit
ted on every hand.
There is a foreign element in our
voting population which is both illit-
crate and ignorant of our institutions
This element is neither democratic nor
republican. 1t is for sale-openly and
VIGOROUSLY for sale. AS matters fall
out at the elections, the votes of this
element are about equally divided, be-
cause both parties are forced to deal
with it. and each party gets its share.
: 1t is the cause of the great and bur
densome expense of political cam
paigns in this territory. In Maricopa
county, for example, it is customary
for each party to raise from $4,000 to
$4,000 as a campaign fund. Most of
this fund is extorted from candidates
for the county officers as their con
trary, and cannot be avoided. 1t is
graded according to the value of the
offices sought; the candidate for sher-
if putting up the largest sum, but
even the candidates for the most insig-
nifcant offices must put up their share.
The two parties. with an aggregate
siush fund of $4,000 to $4,000, then
start in to outmaneuver each other in
getting control of the purchasable vote.
The result is generally about an even
break in dealing with this element,
shrewdness of management being a
factor. of course. The two parties to-
gether cannot spend $1,000 legitimate
~ in a county campaign. The same
conditions apply all over the terrific
ry, but in some counties more than
in others because this well defined ele-
ment is larger in some sections than in
others, Altogether. it is conservative
estimate to say that every two years
there is total of at least $4,000 ex-
pended in our county campaigns i'll
buying and controlling" votes. More
than one defalcation can be directly
traced to the expense to which the
candidate was subjected in obtaining
his office.
The pernicious practice is abhorred
and denounced by republicans and
democrats alike. 1t exists because I'M
der our present laws this element has
the right to vote, and it's leaders and
their followers hold up both parties in
cold blood.
But the expense of the campaigns is
a minor feature in comparison with the
attendant evils of an established sys-
tenn of vote-buying. Familiarity with
crime breeds a liberation of crime in
the public mind. The moral sense of
good citizens becomes blunted. The
debauchery of the electorate is bound
to grow. if unchecked.
Americans in Arizona have not yet
reached the point of selling their votes.
But as the purchase of elections be-
comes more brazen and open, and as
wholesale bribery becomes more and
more the rule, we shall find our Amer
lean population falling before the
temptation, the public conscience hav-
ing been du1led by the repetition Of
election crimes This is true of some
of the eastern states. and it viii be-
come true of Arizona. If no check is
interposed There is no more purely
American stock in the union than the
population of Rhode Island, and yet
that state has become a veritable rot
ten borough. The evil is reaching
menacing proportions in Arizona be-
cause of the slight difference in the
strength of the two politica! parties,