Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-08-18
Vote Yesterday Did Not Equal
That Cast in 1917---city
Employees Active.

The voters of this city yesterday
failed to take advantage of the sec
lond opportunity offered them to IN
stall commission government in
Perth Amboy instead of the present
system. The proposed new form Of
government was voted down, l,56f
ito 1859, a difference of 39S votes,
Two OF the wards in the city. the
first and second, as predicted, favor
ed the change but the other four
went strongly against it. Out Of the
seventeen polls here. only three
favored the commission idea.
Although the vote was light early
in the day there was a rush to the
polls between the hours of and
last night which helped somewhat
to boost the total votes cast. AS II
was, however, yesterdays total vote
did not reach the vote polled In
1917, the date of the last comufis-
sion government election here.
At the 1917 election there were
2,777 votes. cast. Yesterday the total
number of ballots cast was 2,756,
difference of forty-one. Ine 1917 the
issue was defeated by 1873 votes,
those opposing the change casting
st numbered 1927. Yesterdays re-
suits show sss more opposing it
than favoring it.
At the 1917 election all four polls
of the first ward and both polls in
the second ward favored the change
and gave fairly large majorities, ia
in the first and 27 in the second.
Yesterday only the first and second
polls of the first ward and the hrst
poll of the second ward voted for
commission government. The first
two polls of the first ward gave the
commission idea S5 majority ana
the first poll of the second ward IL.
In the second and third polls of the
against the change were recorded,
cutting down the yes majority to-
~. In the second poll of the sec
ond ward the mo- voters had one
more ballot than did the yes thus
cutting down that majority to II.
These three yes" majorities,
amounting to "a, were the only ones
received during the election
In the third ward alone enough
votes against the change were cast
to overcome the lead secured in the
first and second wards in favor of
the proposition Both first and sec
ond polls of the third ward went
against the commission idea by
majority of fifty, making a total OF
100 majority for the ward. The 1917
results gave 138 against commission
government in this ward.
The fourth ward gave 119 votes
10 defeat the move as compared to
143 in 1917. The closest fight in this
ward was in the second poll where
the mays" won out by a small mar
gin of 8. In the first poll of the
fourth ward a majority of 90 was
piled up The majorities in the third
hnd fourth polls were each rs.
1t had been expected that the fifth
ward would see a close fight. especi-
ally on account of the strength OF
Alderman John ]. Clark. who came
but publicly in favor of commission
government. Such was not the case.
however. as the move was defeated
by los votes, 73 in the first poll and
B2 in the second. This ward in 1917
Favored the present system OF gov
ernment by 9S votes.
The sixth ward gave the anti
commission idea the biggest blow of
hny in the city, a 16S majority, which
WAS 63 more than was polled in that
section at the 1917 election. The
first poll of the sixth ward turned
out a sufficient number of votes
against commission to more than
overcome the grand total OF the
rave votes IN the tuEco pulls u ttiS
drst and second wards, where COM
mission had been favored. A 124
majority was found In the first poll
Of the sixth ward.
A close fight was to be found IN
the second poll of the sixth Waro
where a difference of but three
votes was to be found. The ants
collected 129 here and the pros"
i26. A forty-one majority for those
opposing commission was found IN
the third poll of the sixth ward.
The number of votes cast yester-
day shows a lack of interest on the
part of voters here to cast ballot
either one way or the other. De-
spite the fact that those favoring
the present regime won by 39S votes
their total, if it had been received
by the opposition, would not have
been sufficiently large 10 prlng
about the change.
A total OF 1854 votes in favor OF
commission and a majority over the
opposition was necessary to put the