Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 6, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 March 1879 — FREE ELECTIONS. [ARTICLE]

FREE ELECTIONS.

The Responsibility for the Failure of the Appropriation Bills—Speech of Hon. J. I>. C. Atkins, Chairman of the Appropriation Committee. Mr. Speaker: After our exhausting labors I promise that I shall detain the House but a few moments. Memberswill bear me witness that I am not in the habit of occupying the floor long at a time, indeed as seldom as my duty will permit I regret that the conference ooirmlttee upon this bill, which 1 regard the most Important of the Appropriation bills; hate utterly failed to agree. We have had three sittings; we have discuseel thb question In evety possible pliaSe of it, and wfe Have found it impossible to crime to any agreement What might have been effected, if the whole subject had beep left to the conferees themselves alone, it is not necessity for file hote to say; nor am I warranted in saying eton that they could have come to a conclusion. But they each felt that there was a power behind them which would admit of no agreement The disagreement between them is radical. As you know, Mr. Speaker, the House has demanded in, I may say, unmistakable terms free elections, untrammeled < lections. The House has demanded also intelligent j uries, and that jurors should not be subjected to test oaths while members of Congress coming from the Southern States and representing the majesty of the people upon this floor are not subjected-to such oaths. Upon glancing at the clock I am reminded that I must be very brief. I had designed to discuss these subjects sotnewhat more at length than I Will now do On account of the limited time, and because I owe to my colleagues on the oonference committee a courtesy which lam determined to pay. I must, therefore, be as concise as possible. There were about 100 amendments to the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Appropriation bill. We were enabled to agree in regard to most of these amendments. We did not agree to the salaries of the officers and employes of the Senate and House of Representatives. I believe it is but candid to say, however, that if we could have agreed upon the other points we might have agreed upon that Mr. Speaker, the deliberate action of this House in attaching the repealing clause to the Legislative, Executive and Judicial'Appropriation bill of certain sections of the Revised Statutes has been respected and firmly maintained by the majority members of the House conferees. Upon so grave a question, one not measured by a mere appropriation of money, but involving the rights and liberties of American citizens, the majority of the House conferees did not hesitate a moment to resolutely stand by the injunctions and carry out the action of the body which created our functions. Whatever individual opinions of mere policy in the beginning I or any other Representative may have entertained, and upon which it is usual to exercise the broadest latitude and the most liberal discretion in conference, here is a question involving the most sacred rights and privileges of the citizen, around whifch this House has thrown the agis of its protection and over which this committee has been intrusted a special guardianship, and one which they had no disposition to disregard.

The committee could not agree upon that feature of the bill which proposes to repeal the test oath now applied to Federal juror*. The importance of selecting juries from among the most intelligent of the people is too plain to admit of argument. The rights of property, the well-being of society, and the safety of the best a law which drives intelligence from the jurybox and installs it with ignorance and prejudice. What public or private harm can result from the repeal of such a law is to my mind inexplicable. Without its repeal the substantial ends of justice will continue to be defeated and the sanctity of the verdicts and judgments of juries and of courts will sink into ridicule and contempt. Surely, any law which becomes contemptible in it* execution, and irritates rather than appeases and assuages popular sentiment is radically wrong and ought to be repealed. The conference committee were equally unfortunate in not agreeing upon the provisions of the bill which repeal the laws authorizing the appointment of Supervisors and Deputy Marshals. So far as the Supervisors are intended to supervise elections and see that a failcount is had, I have heard no complaint. These officers are selected from both political parties, and, if confined to simply supervising elections to prevent fraud, there is not any special objection.

But when these officers arc used for police purposes—to make arrests and otherwise interfere with the rights of citizens—there is a vital and fundamental objection. There is no warrant in the constitution for clothing Supervisors with police powers; that power is lodged with the States But grant that the constitution clothes them with police duties and powers, why should they, aided by an army of Deputy Marsha s, turn upon that constitution and rend it by defeating a fair election? That such has been the unvarying and oft-repeated result for years past is not seriously denied that I am aware of. These Deputy Marshals are invariably selected on account of their known partisanship and efficiency in manipulating and managing elections; they are appointed by the administration on account of their facility and readiness to work for the attainment of party ends. Realizing that the language of the constitution (article I, section 4) only confers the power upon Congress to decide when, where and how the elections of members of Congress may be held and conducted, but does not extend to the qualifications of voters except such as are made necessary under State constitutions to render a citizen eligible as an elector for members of the most numerous branch of the State Legislature this House and the country feel that the system of laws which should protect the sanctity of the elective-franchise may be, and has been, converted into an ingenious enginery to deny and even overthrow the purity of the ballot-box, which lies at the base of the very citadel of freedom. All agree that in America a free, unobstructed and unintimidated ballot is fundamentally essential to free institutions, and any supervision which prevents its voluntary and unfettered exercise is at war with the spirit of the constitution, no matter though its enopty forms may be complied with. The practical effect of these laws has been to prevent fair elections and arouse in the public mind the gravest apprehensions for that purity and legality without which elective government becomes a simple mockery. If intimidated and the fear of arrest drive electors from the polls orforce them to vo*e against their will, in what does the plebiscite of France which elevated Napoleon to be the supreme ruler of that country differ from our boasted lights of suffrage?" No more violent assault was ever made upon the freedom of the elective franchise in France during that period of simulated liberty to which I have just referred, when to have refused to support this mock hero of republicanism was equivalent to incarceration in the Bastile, than was made in the great city of New York and other places on the day of the election in November last, when thousands of American citizens were arrested and imprisoned with the sole view of preventing them from voting. That such acts of tyranny so utterly subversive of liberty may not be repeated this House has taken its stand in the sacred name freedom, and demands the repeal of the laws under the cover of which these wrongs were perpetrated. The right of the representatives of the people to withhold supplies is as old as English liberty. History records numerous instances where the common feeling that people were oppressed by laws that the lords would not con sent to repeal by the ordinary methode of legislation obtained redrees at last by refusing ap - propriations unless accompanied by relief ' measures. This is not an ordinary affirmative proposition which is here sought to be engrafted upon this bill to be carried through by virtue of its momentum, but it is simply a relief measure, a repeal of a bad law. The system of laws so ingeniously blended to obstruct the free exercise of the elective franchise, and against which the majority in this House is now arrayed, grew out of the military ideas which have dominated the legislation of this country since the war. But the time has now come -when these measures of injustice and inequality, so long and so patient ly endured, must give way to the advancing and well-grounded sentiment of free elections in all the States of this Union, and the equal rights of all men at the ballot box. As long as these relics of military domination remain upon the statute-book just‘so long will the public mind continue to be agitated. As long as statutory contrivances continue to be used to defeat the popular will, so long will the people struggle to wipe them out As, long, too as these measures encumber the statute-book economic questions of administration will retire before their presence. For what matters any given line of policy if the people are denied the right of suffrage, or if the chosen Representatives of the people are ejected by arbitrary power from the places to which they have been elected? We, therefore, submit the general disagreement, and now relegate to the House

the trust imposed by the expression of its judgment and action. Speaking for myself alone, it seems to me that the majority, having demanded the repeal of these iniquitous laws, have reached a point where retreat is impossible .and where it will be easier to go through than retrace their steps. Whatever responsibility attaches to either house or either party, or the individual members of each, either the one or the other, for the failure of these appropriation bills, the people will fix it where it belongs. That the majority of this House should be blamed for demanding the repeal of statutes which are unjust and unconstitutional, is hardly probable. Believing, therefore, that the repeal is justified by every conside at ion of fairness and right, the majority can well afford to submit this issue to the verdict of ths people.