The daily morning journal and courier., 1907-01-17
SENATE COMMITTEE 10
 OPEN BALLOT BOX
TO RECOUNT THE VOTES TO DE- CIDE HOMAN-STATES
 CONTEST.

Petitioners Claim That Mir. States Got
 His Seat by Mathematical Error on
 the Part of the Counters of the Ward
 in Question-Town Clerk Whitaker
 Identifies Return Sheet of the Vote
 Cast in the Election in Entire City,
 Other Witnesses.
 Hartford, Jan. 16.-The ballot box used in the Fourth ward in New Ha- ven at the last election will be opened by the senate committee on contest ed elections next Tuesday afternoon, in order that the votes cast in the Tenth Senatorial district contest be- tween Senator James N States, demo- crat, an Franklin L. Homan repub- lican, may be counted. The hearing was hedl this afternoon, Senator Wal Ter presiding. MT. States was repre- sented by Attorney Loomis, and MT. Homan by Attorneys Hoyt and Isaac Wolfe The claim of the petitioners was that MT. States got his seat by a mathematical error on the part of the counters in the Fourth ward, who tabulated the count on split tickets. The witnesses present were Town Clerk Whitaker who identified the return sheet of the vote cast in the election in the entire city; Fred. J. 1 Brothers, who, as moderator of the First ward, served as moderator of the 1 city, and received the Fourth ward returns, Joseph Cohn, a democratic counetr in the Fourth ward, Joseph J. Reilly moderator in that ward; Day- i'd Fitzgerald, an attorney, also a countet, all of whom, except MT. 1 Whitaker, are democrats, and John Martin, the republican counter, who l tabluated with MT. Cohn on the split tickets. The tally sheets used in the ward were shown and explained, and an error of 100 votes, which in effect l was deficiency in MT. Homan's to-a tai, was pointed out. All these wit nesses had had their attention called l to the supposed error on the night of | the election. Tn the case of the count CTS they were willing to make a corr rection in the total, but this was not permitted by Dr, Brothers, the moder- \ ator, because the return from the ward showed no error in the figures The error was on the counters tally sheet, from which the return to the moder- ator was copied. Each witness de- scribed the method of counting the bal <. lots on the night in question, finally the committee declined to hear any more evidence along this line, deemS ing it only a repetition.
 The attorneys were given opportun- ity to make arguments, and Mir. Hoyt claimed that the error was a n1athe- mathical one. He was asked by Chair man Waller to quote an authority by which the legislature had the right to alter the figures on the legal returns, and unseat member without opening the ballot boxes to verify the count. MT. Hoyt said that he could proba- by quote such an authority MT. Loom- is in his argument quoetd McClary on election to show that there has never been a case where4a member has been unseated on tally sheet figures, that
 such evidence was not admissible uH- less the ballots had been destroyed.
 Chairman Waller said that the ques-
 ton was mt that of a mathematical
 error, but that of doing justice to all, l, and the fairest way was to open the ballot box. A supoena will be issued on
 Town Clerk Whitaker to produce the ballot box.