Democratic Sentinel, Volume 13, Number 42, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 November 1889 — The Australian Ballot in Connecticut. [ARTICLE]

The Australian Ballot in Connecticut.

The New York Times dispatch from Hartford says: “The secret envelop" ball t, which was used for the first time in this State at the elections Monday, has elated its friends and silenced its opponents. Could a popular vote be ordered concerning its continuance it wo’d be rewritten on the statute booi., even with the minor defects n :*ted, i»v a tremendous majority throughout the State. To all intents and pnrpcse it g'-ive what it purported to —a secret ballot. The persistency of ticket and paster peddlers, who were able under the old system to pursue a man to the very ballot-box itself, was wholly esl- - by the voter under the new law, which prohibits these election pests from coming within L‘)o feet of tht polL. “The elector’s booth gave the vo'er place and opportunity to arrange hi? ballot to suit himself. — During the three minutes allowed him by law in tie booth he was free from outside influence and intimidation of every kind The voting was the freest which has taken place in the State for 30 years. In two conspicuous instances the political effectiveness of the law* was tie nons'wated. The Democrats at Windsor Locks nominated a ticket notoriously unfit for support. Eq spite of the fact that he town is a Democratic stronghold, the secret ballot defeated the party managers and turned lhe control of public interests over to the opposition for the year. At Norwich ttm tables were turned on the Republicans who had stabiished a political bossism that had prevailed since th da vs of Buckingham. In neither of these towns would Monday’s result have been possible under the old svstem. The new law has proved itself in principle the mortal foe of corrupt and dishorest politics.” A New York Sun dispatch from Norwich says: “Since the civil war times this town has been kno .vn all over southern New England as the ‘Citadel of Connecticut Re* publicans. To day every buttress of the citadel which has been sha ken for several years got a clean knock out r low, and the old thing was tumbled into the moai of public repudiation. The secret ballot helped to do it, for in no part of the Union has political bulldozing on the part of the mill towns been more flagrantly and audaciously exercised. In some of the mill villages it has jbeen worth a mill hand’s job for him to vote openly, as he Pad to do under the old time ballot for Democratic national or township offices. Often ’.lien the hands employed by the mosi powerful corporations were driven in the mill teams in squads of thirtr or forty to the polls, and all overseers walked with the vorer to the boxes to be sure that he cast the ballot the bosses had prearranged he should deposit. To-day e3ch voter was compelled by law to prepare his ba’lot in one of the numerDu little booths provided for that purp se, and screened by closed dowrs, place his ballot in an envelope and se T that envelope before ne c mil legally go to the ballot box an d deposit it.”