The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1911-08-28
County Institute when but 125 wer,
employed in the County.
Gzve Eight Governors.

Gsve Eight Governors.
Eight governors of Ohio, have been
natives of Adams County Numerous
United States senator's have had their
origin there. including Beverage, OF
Indiana. Among other celebrities who
were born in Adams County, or whose
families were native to it, were Gen
eral Grant, Grover Cleveland. White
law Reid and John A. Cockerill.
Judge Blair, in short. stated. with
out bubble. tina. the people of Adams
County were among the most enHght-
ened and advanced OF the unaduiterat-
ed, simon pure American.
Il am glad it has been my privilege
to live in Adams County among such
a people," said Judge Blair
The trouble began when a County
seat war was inaugurated. through an
enactment passed by the state legis-
lature permitting change to be made
from Manchester to West Union. A
prominent citizen was offered $500 for
his influence alone, and anywhere
from ten to seventy-five dollars for
votes.
No One Complained.
Money flowed like water and no
body complained" said the Judge
selves as justified in this procedure on
account of the advisability or mad
visibility of moving the County-seat
either way, according to partizan
viewpoint.
This established precedent which
had been followed until December,
1911, when Judge Blair began his cru
SADIE against vote-sellers. Prosecuting
attorneys, mayors, marshalls and 9th
er officials stood by, made no protest
and encouraged it according to their
party bias.
Men were put on the block and
their votes auctioned of on the streets
and the buyer, to see that he got his
moneys worth, took the purchased
one by the ear and marched him up
to see that his vote was cast as sold.
That these conditions were tolerat-
ed by the state and nation was shown
| by the selection and appointment of
various Adams County politicians to
national Offices of authority and i'm
| portance.
"You couldn't even get teachers
certificate unless you stood in with
the powers that be-" said Judge Blair.
That there we're two standards of
| honesty current in Adams county was
shown by the fact that a man who
was made executor Of an estate Of
100000 without requiring bond, and
yet this same mans word politically
| was null and void
Became Too fragrant.
So fragrant had abuses become that
in 1889 law was passed to enable the
authorities to go after the vote-buyer,
and in 1891, one under which the vote
seller could be prosecuted and it was
under the latter law that Judge Blair
and his confreres operated in 1910.
Judge Blair went into a detailed ex-
| PLANTATION of the reasons for going af-
ter the sellers rather than the buyer,
which, briefly summarized, seemed to
be that the buyers offense, being more
heinous, according to the punishment
that could be meted out under the
law, and the consequent demoraliza-
| ton in carrying on the affairs of the
| life of the community owing to it's
leading citizens either langushing in
| the state bastile or suffering from dis
| reimbursement and other minor SEN
| fences, it was thought best to make
/ an example of the seller whose max
imum sentence was $25 fine, brief
reimbursement for Ave years.
Because Judge Blair, who in the
meantime had changed politics for in
dividual reasons from Democratic to
Republican, signed an agreement to
do away with the abuses of vote-sel-
| ling, he was denounced by his party's
| leaders, who endeavored to show him
the ruin it would bring to the party's
interests.
Men, signed it in good faith and
by the eternal gods NY name is going
to stay" said Judge Blair.
And SO the vote sellers were gone
after as is known to every reader of
the newspaper.
Out of $500 voters, 26 per cent were
disfranchised. An interesting common
tary on the relative morals of the
"wets" and "drys" was made in the
statement that the Oldest "dry" pre-
cinct in the county, which had one
hundred voters, had but three disfran-
chised. In the latest wet" precinct
fifty per cent of the voters were dis
franchised.
Judge Blair gave an interesting and
entertaining account of the local poll
teal conditions which led up to the
awakening of the political consciences
of the voters of Adams county, and the
consequent pleading Of guilty, without
consequent indictment by the MAORI
ty of the delinquents. Whether this