Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1912-03-22
WHY THE POLITICIANS WAL.

might have been expected from that group of polit
clans who are the chief and indeed the only disciples
Of reactionary thought in Georgia and who are hope
lessly welded to their craft
Naturally enough, these gentlemen, devoted as
they machine politics, protest against set of
rules that give the people themselves full and
elusive power in choosing a presidential nominee
Naturally enough, they prefer system that would
throw this important matter into convention where
by hook or crook the real will of the people as ex
pressed at the polls might be diverted or wholly
reversed.
Under the plan prescribed by the committee, the
individual citizen will his ballot for whomsoever
he may choose, the candidate thus receiving the
greatest number of votes will forthwith become the
winner and be given Georga's support in the ma
tional contest. There will be bargaining among
divided delegates at a convention, manipulations
from which the people excluded, none
of those deals or combinations by which
the popular will is often turned
aside The people and the people alone will have
the first and the last word There will be conven-
ton made up of delegates chosen in each county
from among the friends of the successful candidate
but this convention will act in purely ministerial
capacity, simply formulating the result at the polls
and naming the required number of delegates to the
national convention. 1t will not be gathering of
political trafckers to override the popular choice
This plan is not only the simplest and the surest
means of ascertaining the states preference of
presidential nominee but it is the only means that is
logical or fair. The object of this primary is to de-
termine how the vote of Georgia a state shall be
cast in the national convention at Baltimore. 1t is
primary to deal with national candidates and ma
tional issues The state act in it's entirety not
as so many separate counties, any more than as so
many militia districts The state, in short, must, in
this case, be considered as a unit, bearing to the
country a whole the same relation that the vari-
Gus counties bear to the state itself in gubernato-
rial primary.
1t is, therefore, irrelevant and, indeed wholly
meaningless to contend that the county unit system
has been abolished the ground that the committee
has provided for the candidate with the largest
Der of receive the states entire delegation
For as we have shown in presidential primary the
state is itself the unit.
Georgia is member of the national household
just Fulton county is member of the state. In
a primary to choose nominee for the governorship
the county casts its convention vote a unit Like
WISE in primary to choose nominee for the presi
dency the state should cast it's vote unit. In
the instance it may happen that the candidate
who is the choice of the county as whole is not
the choice of every militia district every city
ward but no one would be so foolish to say that
he should not receive the countys full convention
vote In like manner since the state is the unit in
presidential primary the candidate who is the choice
of the state whole is entitled to the states
tire vote although he does not receive the vote of
every county every militia district Therefore the
gentleman who contend that the committee in apply
ing this logical pan has abolished the county unit
system are, in truth, arguing against the inherent
idea back of the county unit system ITSELF and if
they pursued their falacy its consistent end they
would destroy the county the unit in statehouse
primaries just they ignore the state as the
: unit in presidential primary.
The fact is the committee has followed in all es-
sentials precisely the rule that prevailed in
the last gubernatoriaI primary, the under which
Governor Brown himself was nominated In that
primary, the candidate who received the largest
Der of votes in any county entitled to that
countys unit vote and he who received the plurality
of such votes among all the counties declared
the nominee. The purpose of that plan to avoid
second primaries and other entanglements. 1t was
considered at the time eminently fair to everyone
concerned and so it proved effect.
For the presidential primary, the committee has
prescribed the rule, at the same time bearing
in mind the fact that in this the state is the
unit and that therefore whoever receives the largest
number of votes from the people whole, is
titled to the states delegated vote
This plan is as fair to one candidate as another,
for it puts them all common basis. If Mr..
Underwood is given more ballots at the polls than
any of his opponents he will be declared the nominee
so far as this states preference is concerned Like
wise if Governor Harmon or Governor Wilson
Speaker Clark receives the largest number of votes
he will have proved himself among all the candi-
dates the choice of the greatest number of Georgans
and will have the states support in the convention.
This is the only plan that assures a truly pop
ular verdict and an enforcement of that verdict
where so many candidates in the field. under
any other rule it would be possible for candidate
without getting either majority plu-
rality of the peoples votes to get majority of the
counties, at least sufficient number of them to
deadlock convention and thus to defeat utterly the
peoples will expressed at the polls.
To prevent any such contingency is the purpose
of the rule the committee has adopted 1t places the
power to Georgia's nominee for the presidency
wholly within the hands of the voters themselves
and makes the convention purely ministerial agency
to carry out the peoples choice In brief it has
tabshed popular rule, instead of machine politics,
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