The American issue. [volume] (Westerville, Ohio) 1912-19??, 1926-03-26
Why the Drys Will Not Vote

eoldUOn the poor WelS nave, ana the uryS,
therefore, do not begrudge them this lit
tie pastime, but it is in order to set forth
herewith a few reasons why the drys will
not vote and why on some of the ques-
tions they could not vote if they wouds
First of all, they will not vote in any
large number for the reason that under
the plan presented it is utterly impossible
by this means TO obtain an honest vote.
This is not questioning the honesty of
the newspapers nor even impugning the
motive Of these papers. We have in this
country the Australian ballot as a safe
guard against fraud at the polls. In all
our large cities voters must register. They
are checked up carefully before being al
lowed to cast their ballots. And yet, in
spite of the Australian ballot, in spite of
the registration law, frauds are COM
mitted. What, then, of a system that
prints ballot in newspaper, which bal
lot can be procured for the price of the
paper and in any quantity desiredl
Names may be forged on ballots in
thousand lots without the least possible
chance of detection It is explained that
these ballots will be checked up by city
directories and telephone books. How
about the ballots that are sent to Cleve-
land from all over central Ohio? What
is to prevent the forgery of names, names
that will check up all right in the city
directories? What is to prevent the town
wag from going to the cemetery and vot-
ing every tombstone? The name won't
be in the city directory, but little towns
don't have city directories. The whole
scheme is asinine and calls for time worse
than wasted. For that reason drys will,
for the most part ignore It. =
Furthermore, there Is no provision
made whereby aliens can be prevented
from participating in this ballot Ar alien
who is not legal voter should not be al
lowed to participate in straw vote de-
signed to influence legislation. Nor is
there any provision made to check up
against minors Some of the newspapers
require declaration that the voter has
attained the age of 81. Others make no
such requirement. How is the newspaper
to know if mere children participate in
the vote? Then, too, there are many peo-
pie who read more than one daily paper
carrying the ballot Assuming that each
newspaper is careful to Gull out all re-
peaters, what is to prevent one person
from voting in any number of newspa-
pers? Remember, there are 100 such
papers carrying these ballots in the United
States.
One who is in favor OF making the
Eighteenth Amendment truly effective
could not vote yes or no on the one
question submitted in the ballot, as car
ried in the Columbus Citizen under the
auspices of the N. E. A., which is sup
posed to give the dry an opportunity to
cast his vote 1t reads: 81 am in favor
of continuing present prohibition laws"
A dry who wants to see the prohibition
laws enforced would have to vote yes,
with quali6catons-tha is, he would
have to vote, Yes until the law can be
made more effective" For instance, there
is now before Congress a proposition to
change the law establishing the prohibi-
ton unit as a separate bureau, under the
prohibition department. 1t is proposed to
embody civil service requirements for
prohibition agents, etc. The trainers of