Rensselaer Union, Volume 11, Number 23, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 20 February 1879 — The Apportionment Question. [ARTICLE]

The Apportionment Question.

- ORTHODox.-Reprpspn tat Ivo Wll In ril claims that Ills democracy is ns orthodox as that of Representative Maurice Thompson, although thb latter enjoys the prestige of having “followed the fiery cross through tlie South four years.” This coincides with what republicans have always suid, to-vfit: That t|iero was no difference, save in the degreo of courage, between Indiana democrats nml Southern rebels. It is re]K)rted that tlie committee of ways and moans of our state legislature have decided not to recommend an appropriation for Purdue university and to cut off tlie stute normul school witii a very limited allowance. Should ibis report be true it will only prove that tlie democracy of Indiana are consistent with their record of hostility to educational interests. They will readily cripple that which should be fostered with tlie tenderest care, but will never reduce tlie extravagant salaries and lees of many public offices*

Want a Grab.— The state board of agriculture are begging for an appropriatloii of nearly SIOO,OOO to relleve them of the embarrassment caused by debt and bard times. In consideration of a small favor of this kind they will deed to tlie state the grounds ami improvements for which tlie iudeht. edness was contracted. It’s a cheeky proposition that should not receive tlie slightest encouragement from tlie legislature. The state no doubt might buy fifty or a hundred millions of realty equally as valuableasan investment, ami do far more charitable service, but she bus no jiossible use for anything of the kind at present. Let the state board of agriculture struggle along through tlie pinch if it can, us individuals and otlier as worthy corporations are doing; if it survives it will be just us vigorous and far more ind#|>endent and useful than if pampered and emusculated by such misapplied charity; if it dies the Joss will scarcely be felt by tlie general public outside the limits of Marion county. Half Price — When the surveyor of Jasper county, whose maiden name was Lewis S Alter, came last week to tlie clerk of Jasper county who is known among men and fellows as Charley Price, and demanded of him the cost of a marriage license, the latter official thought tlwt'tlie master of tripods and triangulation was only joking; therefore, himself an inveterate jester, the scribe answered and said : “As it is you, Lewis, and we have been boys together, and our pa' rents owned farms that join one to another, and as you area felTow officer, and an exceedingly handsome as well ns modest gentleman, and as I like to encourage enterprise and public spirit, if you will take out the papers to-day while business is a little slack, the same you may have for half price.” To which tlie county surveyor replied “I’ll take em ; the metes and bounds of that tact are described as follows, to-wit: Beginning at a point in the southwest comer of section—that is, I mean to say her name is Sarah E. Nash.’’ And the aforesaid license was issued lor half thu. regular price.

From the Indianapolis Journal. During the last campaign the people of Indiana heard many diatribes against tlie infamous character of ihc republican “gerrymander” of 1872. not that democratic complaints of the apportionment of that year were a new thing, for from the time it was made they have never ceased to protest against It as on outrage.' All grades nnd conditions of democracy have denottneed it as unfair, unjust, n wicked invasion of'the political rights of a large portion of the voters of the state. Hendricks, when governor, always inveighed against it in his messages, and Governor Williams made it the subject of a special message to the legislature of 1877, in which he urged,, in the strongest possible language, the coirection of inequalities in tbo voting power of a number of districts selected by him as examples. From all this it might logically be supposed that, having come into power, the democracy would be slow to repeat what fox years (hey hate denounced before the people as an iniquity. If it was a wrong dono by the republican party, it must be a wrong if repeated by the democratic parly, and the latter is surely estoppo l from justifying what they now propose to do by pleading the course of the former, It is not understood that when denouncing thi republican apportionment they appealed to the people to put them in power so that, by way of reprisal, they might make an apportionment that would disfranchise the republican nnd national parties; but, rather, that they might make a perfectly fair apportionment, it is not probubttHhat many experienced aud reflective persona supposed thoy would keep any such promise; but it is appnrer.t enough that a sufficient number of voters did confide in their professions to put them temporarily in power. How far that confidence was justified wo tball try to show in a partial analysis of the aportiOnmcnt bill for ( legislative purposes which passed the house last week am! comes up in the senate for oonsidv/alion to-day. The enumerrtion of the voliri of thA state, taken last ye|r, shown that Indiana possess** voters. This would entitle each 9,G20 voters to be rej'rutonted by a lenalor, aod

each 4,610 voters to he represented by a member of the lower house of the general assembly. Parties are no*, recognised in tlio constitution, to that the only purpose that can proporly bo considered by an honoat who cares for the oath of office he took, is the passage of a bill that, in the closest possible decree, will conform to the only requirement of the constitution. The member who looks at political lines instead of an exact division of the voting population, commits moral porjury. In house bill 84(), as it passed last week, out of fifty senatorial districts just sixteen districts cotne within 500 votes of the exact constitutional basis, whieh, considering the difficulty of massing the counties, with their varying population, so that an exact division may be secured, is perhaps close enough, so far aa those districts aro concerned. But vfo find six districts with less than 8,000 voters, five with less than 7,500, one with less than 7,000, and three with less than 6,500, making fifteen districts which lack from 500 to 3,014 voters of the number necessary to entitle them to u,senator under Ihe constitution of the state. We also find one district with over 12,000 voters, one with over 11,500, two with over M-.OOOj -thre* with over 10,500, six with over 10,000, and six with over 9,600, making nineteen districts wjth from 600 to 3,168 voters who are disfranchised and unrepresented, as, under the constitution, they have a light to be. Making all proper allowance for the difficulty of making an exact apportionment, it must be said that the bill referred to in no wise presents an effort to overcome those difficulties; but the inequalities represent simply tlie twisting < f geographical lines to accommodate political lines, so that forty-seven percent, of democrats may elrct and be represented by 32 senators, while fifty-three per cent, of republicans and nationals will elect and be represented by 18 senators. Turning to the house of representatives, we find that by this bill forty-three districts out of the one hundred come within 250 of possessing the requisite population to entitle them to a representative, which, as we hare said, is 4,510. But we find three districts with less than 4,250, three with less than 4,000, seven with less than 3,500, one with less than 2,500, and four with less than 2,000. Un the other hand, we find four districts with over 6,000 voters, thirteen with over 6,500, fifteen with over , 6,000, nnd seven with more than 4,800. - As extremes, we find a surplus of 1,536 voters in democratic Knox, Sullivan and Greene counties provided with a “floating” representative, while 7,627 voters in republican Lagrange and Steuben on’y have one. As in the case of-the senate, these gteat disparities are caused almost wholly in the effort to give the democracy an overwhelm- . ing majority over the combined republicans | and nationals, the bill giving the former sixty-one representatives to thirty-nine for the two latter.