Weekly Arizona journal-miner., 1907-02-13
Editorial Comment

bc commended by the taxpayers throughout the county, because they will have inc privilege this year of reading ihc official proceedings and transactions of the Board. During the past year, weekly newspaper at Con. grrss Junction has been the official paper, it having received the contract in February, 1906. by reason of its having been the lowest bidder. At that time the Journul.Mincr pointed out that the action of the Board was unwisc and would result in general dis. satisfaction, and the results have jus tiGcd that criticism
 AS regards county printing. the law specifically states that the contract shall bc given to the "best and most rcsponsiblc' bidder, and there is no | question but that II was the intent of , the Legislature to invest the Super. visors with discretionary powers in or. der that the Board might place the con. tract with n paper having n large and | general circulation. The advertising columns of n newspaper are it's mcr. chandisc, and the larger it's circulation the more valuable does that space hc. come. Hence. il would be obviously unfair to place newspaper of large | circulation on m equality as regards bidding with one whose space com. mands small price from advertisers.
 In requiring the Board of Supcrvis. ors to publish the minutes of their pro. cecdings. II is manifcsily the object of inc law ,o secure publicity of the same. | Therefore the effect is io defeat the intent of the law whenever the print. ing contract tx awarded to newspaper | that circulatcs only in remote see. tion of county. When n contract was given year ago to the Congress Junction weekly it was the first in. stance in the history of Arizona that such contract was placed outside of the county seat. In doing so, the Board was probably ac'uated only by motives of ecohomy, hut subsequent events 1 have demonstrated that such action did not operate in the interests of the pco. pie. Only n limited number of per sons ever sec the Congress Junction paper, and consequently, persons whc were allowed their claims against ths county were in ignorance of the fact and several months after the warrant, | were. issued, the Clerk of the Board was constantly in receipt of inquiries asking if certain claims had been al lowed.
 There are many instances of where this lack of publicity proved detri mental to the people, but one partic. ularly fragrant case may bo cited. Re. fore the last general election the Sup. ervisors designated Stoddard as an election precinct The list of precincts of the election was published in the official paper, but as not single copy of it is taken at Stoddard or in the vicinity, the voters of that precinct were unaware of the fact that they could east their vote at that point. On the morning of election some of the moro zealous voters went to Mayer to vote, while other miners, not wishing to lose n halliday, left the camp for their work at the Binghamton mine. About 10 o'clock, one of the election judges arrived nt the Stoddard camp with the ballot box and the ballots, and announced that an election was to be held, The superintendent of the Stod. dard Mining company had been named as one fthe judges, but not until the other election official arrived, did he have any knowledge of the fact. As a result, only few ballots were east at the camp, and the men who had gone to the other camp lost their votes There are other instances where this lack of publicity worked hsrdahip 10