New-York tribune., 1909-02-08
NEW PRIMARY BILL
KINGS EXPECTED TO GIVE
IT SUPPORT.
ProUides for Party Organization as
Vel as Popular Nominations
Nay Be Centre of Fight.

the direct primary nominations bill. which has
been worried out by the committee of the Brook
! lyn Young Republican Club and the special COM
mittee of the Kings County Republican execu-
/ tive committee. It is believed that the bill is
the one upon which the advocates of direct pri-
raries will unite. and which the fight in
/ the Legislature will be waged
The bill. which is to revise the entire primary
election law, provides for party organization and
party tickets to be presented at the primaries
/ by party committees regularly elected by the
electors OF the party. At the same time il pro-
vfdes for independent tickets which must he put
on the primary ballot in the order in which they
! are filed with the proper officers.
| This scheme, those who have prepared the bill
/ say will meet the most serious objection Of the
opponents of direct primaries. which is that the
! system would destroy party organize ton They
also assert that critics who have attacked direct
! primaries on other grounds viii be silenced by
the provisions of this bill.
KINGS EXPECTED TO BACK IT
member of the committee of the Kings
! County Republican Executive Committee said
/ last night that he expected all the Republican
Senators and Assemblymen from Kings County
would be back of the bill That would mean
/ five votes in the Senate and thirteen in the AS
sembly which would start sny bill off with
good backing
taxing the vino out or the sails or those y no
| declare that direct primaries would be move
in the direction of a pure democracy and away
from a representative government. the bill pro
vides for enlargement of the system of rep
resentative committees In brief. II provides
for a system of committees to be elected by the
people at the primaries, starting with election
district committees and including Assembly dis
trict committees. Senate district committees
Congress district committees. county commit
tees, city committees and state committee
These committees are entitled to select tickets
of nominees for offices to be filed in the dis
trlcts within their respective jurisdictions which
tickets must be filed with the proper election
officials not later tLan thirty DAYS before pri-
mary day. This ticket having thus been
nounced, any party eector or group Of electors
has ten days in which to file any independent
nomination or nominations. being obliged TO file
such petition of nomination. with a certain
number Of signatures. not later than twenty
days before the primary
The ticket namsd by the party committee shall
be printed first on the primary ballot and the
Independents tickets nominatiCns shall be
printed beloT tns party ticket IN the order IN
which they placed on ile.
CAN VOTE PART OF TICKET.
For example the state committee would file
nominations for state officials with the Secre-
tary OF State thirty days before the primary.
which nominations would at once be made pub
lie Any elector who believed any candidate or
candidates named by the state committee TO be
UNIT would have ten days in which to get sig
natures 10 a petition petitions placing in
nomination men for one all Of the offices. on
primary day the voter would have the option of
voting by cross for the party ticket in whole
part for any Of such independent tickets as may
have been regularly placed the ballot
The city committee would in like manner
name party ticket for city officials. the Con
gress committee would name man to be voted
on at the primary for Congress nomination. and
SO down the line.
At the same primary where the candidates for
nominations would be voted commit
tees would be selected each year. For instance.
as the Republican State Committee is made up
OF a member from each Congress district. the
Congress district committee would a can
didate for the state committee from it's district.
Any elector not approving the choice Of the
party committee would have the privilege of
making independent nomination. which
would also appear on the ballot. At the pri-
mary the electors would vote for the candidate
they desired, thus insuring the election of
state committee directly responsible to the cleo
tors OF the party.
AS the Democratic party makes up its state
committee according to Senate districts the
candidates for such committee; and OF down
the line nominees for the various committees
are selected by the committees of the sub
divisions of the district over which the commit
tee has control. But independent nominations
are possible in all cases.
LATER PRIMARY DAY
II has been argued against direct primary
nominations that in certain districts it is i'm
possible to get a representative vote at fall
primaries because many people stay out of
town late in the summer. With the system
proposed in the Brooklyn Young Republican
Club bin it will be possible TO fix the primary
day much later than it is now, as late. In fact.
as what is now the last day for filing nomina-
tions under the present system. as Of course, the
series of party nominating conventions would
be entirely done away with and TO time would
have to be allowed for them
The objection that in states it has been
charged that much money has been corruptly
used in direct primary fights is met in the pro-
posed bill by making the various committees
and flers of nominations responsible under the
oorr1,nt practices act for accounting of their
expenditures
The committee of the Brooklyn Young Repub-
1icsn Club which has worked out the bill, con-
sists of Mortimer w Byers Conrad S. Keyes.
Elmer G. Samms. Charles F. Aronstam and
Frank NJ FarweIl, with Darwin r. James. jr..
president of the club, ex-oficio member and
leading spirit The committee of the Republican
organization in Kings County, which has worked
hand in hand with the former committee in
evolving the ideas and hammeriug them into
shape consists of F. J. H Kracks A T. Vass,
CONGRESSMAN w NJ. Calder. Louis NJ. Swazey
and Jacob Brenner. chairman Of the ,-epublican
County Executive Committee.
As stated before. member Of the latter COM
,nittae is responsible for the statement that the