Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1924-09-27

Else Abraham Lincoln and Woodrow
| Wilson, not to mention others, would
| never have been elected president for
| they received no majority Of the
votes Of the people.
Must Follow Precedent
The electors meet in each state
capital. The governor, through the
| secretary Of state, gives them a GER
tificate showing that they have pcen
appointed" electors. Usually the
governor is present in person. the
electors name some one of their
number to act as chairman, and thcn
an embarrassed clerk hauIs out the
proceedings of the electors Of fou1
years before, because no one ever re.
members what to do and how to do
it. Finally all the precedents are OBJ
served and the votes are cast.
Then three lists of the votes are
made and each list is signed by ell
the electors. The electors then name
a special messenger to take the ;,ai-
lots of the president of the senate,
and adjourn without delay, tlet-
function Of acting and not thinking
having been performed.
The electors of each state, meeting
together, form an electoral colleg;a."
Thus there are now As electoral col
leges in a presidential election. This
name has no legal sanction, but was
used in the first election and has be-
come general by custom. In those
days the word college" was much
more used in it's general sense ~ a
collection of body of persons gath
cred for a common purpose than in
its more specific sense Of a faculty
of teachers.
Now that the word is seldom so
| used, erroneous references is some
times made to the whole body of cleo
tors as the electoral college" This
has even given rise to a belief that
all of the electors of the union m9at
IN one body to choose the president,
an impression that graded school
| teachers have taken much pains to
eradicate from the youthful mind.
One of the three lists of votes
made out and signed by the electors
in each state is sent to the president
by the senate by the special mes.
SINGER, one is sent to the same offer
by mail, and the third is deposited
with the federal judge of the district
in which the electors meet.
Ii by the fourth Monday in Jar
uary, that is, in two weeks time. The
president of the senate has not re.
| celVed the vote from any state, then
he requests the secretary of state Of
the United States to send a spe .i4i
| messenger to the district Judge in
whose keeping the tripHcate list has
been left, and upon this request the
secretary of state must cen1
senSer and the judge must forth
with transmit the triplicate list of
! the votes given.
And it is these votes in sealed
packages that the president Of the.
senate brings with him to the hovse
of representatives every four years
on the second Wednesday in FEB
ruary, at | o'clock in the afternoon.
Hayes and Tilden
All OF the minute detail for the
election of a president by the col
lege was not working on tat one sit
ting. In fact, the statute regulating
| the casting of the votes, the method
| of making returns, and the system
OF counting, dates only from Feb
ruary 3, 1887.
! The necessity for this, law be-
came painfully apparent in 1877
when both Rutherford &. HAYES and
| Samuel j. Tilden claimed the cleo
ton, an issue finally decided by the
eXtra-Constitutional electoral commits
sion by strict party vote of s to 7
in favor Of Hayes. Following this
mandate the two houses of congress
counted 1S5 votes for Hayes and 1874
votes for Tilden. As the senate was