The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1918-12-10
Hearing of Contested Local
Onion Election

court house yesterday. 1t came up o
n the application of Richard Lamt
q hotel proprietor, to have the election
! set aside upon a number of technica
grounds. Both the wet and dry force
were well represented in the audience
. filling the court room to capacity.
Henry Heller, counsel for the liquo
: people, relied entirely upon two of tn,
points or objections raised against tn,
!, validity OF the local option election
e namely, that the statutory notice O
e five days publication of the hearing
before the township committee had moi
t been given, and that no provision had
: been made to allow soldiers to vote, as
: required by chapter $50 of the laws Of
: 1918.
: The local option statute requires thai
notice by posters and advertisement
shall be given of the meeting of the
township committee at which the pc
tition, etc., for an election shall be
considered and passed upon. One OF
the requirements is that notice of the
meeting shall be published one time
in local newspaper. This notice was
published in THE NEWS on June IS,
and the meeting was held on June 20.
Counsel claimed that the statute re-
quires this notice to be published at
least five days prior to the date of the
meeting, and that the Supreme court
has so ruled in other similar contests.
In relation to votes of soldiers, Mr.
Heller claimed that the Secretary of
State did not ascertain their names
and send them ballots, nor did he send
to them instructions how to vote or
two envelopes each in which to return
their ballots. He claimed that there
were about $50 soldiers who did not
get chance to vote on the local option
question, and that their ballots might
have changed the result, as prohibi.
ton won by:only So majority.
V. Claude Palmer, counsel for the
township committee, which is defend
ing the election. moved that the ap-
plication be dismissed upon the ground
that its title is in the New Jersey Su-
preme Court whereas it should have
been brought as being before one of
the justices OF the court. The motion
was refused.
| Frank Transue, chief clerk in the
Secretary of States Office, testified that
no effort had been made by that office
to ascertain, 60 days before election,
the names of all soldiers and sailors of
Northampton township who were in
the service of the country, and that 20
days before election ballots were not
mailed to the soldiers and sailors.
On cross examination Mr.. Transue
testified that the Secretary of State
had sent special agents to all the large
military cantonments with ballots for
New Jersey soldiers and had sent bal
lots in bulk to the commanding Off J
GERS of all small camps with requests
that they be distributed to all New
Jersey soldiers. About so or go camps
were thus supplied. None were sent
abroad
Richard s. Folwell, clerk of the local
military registration board, said he
has q record of all men from North
ampton township who were drafted in
to the army. When asked to produce
the list he replied that the seIective
service act of 1917 prohibited the
records from being used in court.
When asked to give an estimate of the
number of residents of the township
who were in the country's service on
election day, he replied about $50, but
he could not tell how many of these
were entitled to vote; but at least 100
were legal voters. He had no know
ledge of how many of these soldiers
we're in camps in the United States,
Harry L. Walters, acting township
clerk, testified as to the number of
votes cast on the local option question,
not including soldier votes, as shown
by tM returns made to him on cleo
ton night by the registry boards. The
vote was: for prohibition, 576; against
prohibition, 519.
Henry H. Savage, secretary of the
county board of elections, testified
that his board had received from the
secretary of state ID soldiers votes to
be counted in Northampton townships
vote. Of this number z had voted on
the local option question.
County Clerk Knight testified that
he had not received from the secretary
of state list of names of soldiers and
sailors in the service of the United
States; also that he had not sent bal
lots to those men because it was not |
his duty to do so.
Judge Kalisch asked Mr.. Heller
that if the local option election was to
be set aside upon the soldier question,
would it not also affect the entire cleo
ton and produce a chaotic condition ? |
This case, the Judge stated, presents |
a different aspect than other contests
AiCAC tOlIolOCICu- lit OLHGTS
were special elections, affecting no
other issues; this was a general cleo
ton, where officials were chosen also. |
The position of the Supreme court has
been one of reluctance in setting aside
general elections on account of the
far-reaching results of such decision
A general election, too, stands upon a
different basis from a special election,
because every voter knows the date of
a general election, which is a regular
event upon a fixed date.
Mr.. Heller argued that no other
question or no officer would be af-
fected.
On the question of insufficiency of
publication, counsel stated, the court
had decided, in similar case in Ere
linghuysen township, that this was
sufficient to set aside an election.
Mr.. Palmer contended that the Ere
linghuysen township case was quite
dissimilar. There, Immediately after
the township committee had passed
upon the petition for an election,
certiorari proceedings were instituted
to prevent the election being held on
account of technical Irregularities in
the preliminary proceedings, resulting
in no election being held. In the
Northampton case the liquor people
waited five months before taking ac-
ton, delaying until after election in
order to ascertain the result, and then