frauds, and subsequent exposures have confirmed me in my opinion. In some districts of the city's plague spots fraudulent voting is the rule and honest voting the exception."

; If our laws were inadequate then, how much more so are they now! There has been no codification since 1839. We have only a patchwork hastily put together from time to time without due regard to actual conditions. The Act of 1839 was passed when Pennsylvania was sparsely settled, but when her population of 1,724,033 was substantially permanent. The population of Pennsylvania is now dense, and in many places, especially in the cities, shifting. No man in the city knows more than a very few of his neighbors, unless he be a politician. The basic principle of machine politics is an accurate knowledge of every man in the district, his shortcomings and his strength, his predilections and his general attitude. A law which might have been adequate for a state population of 1,724,033 and a Philadelphia city population of 258,037 (I quote from the census figures of 1840) can scarcely in the nature of things prove satisfactory for a state numbering 6,302,115 and a city numbering 1,293,697.

Registration.

In some respects the law relating to the registration of voters is the most important law with which we have to deal in describing the election methods prevailing in Philadelphia. Under the Act of 18911 it is made the duty of an assessor to visit in person each and every dwelling house in his district on the first Monday in May and on the first Monday in December of each year, or as soon thereafter as may be possible and practicable, and to make a list in a book prepared for that purpose by the county commissioners, of all the qualified electors he may find upon careful and diligent inquiry, to be bona fide residents of his district, together with the date of his visit. There is one assessor to each

1 P. L. 134.

election district in the City of Philadelphia. As there are 1,014 election districts or precincts, there are 1,014 assessors. The assessor is almost invariably chosen by the party primaries. He is usually a man unknown to the voters at large and for reasons which will become apparent later on, is chosen because of his willingness to act as the tool of the leader or boss by whom he is selected. Not infrequently assessors have been chosen who could not write and in many wards the assessors do little more than take the previous assessors' lists and add such names as they are directed to add by the politicians. Under the law they are only required to take the names given them by whosoever answers the door. In many localities they gather their information chiefly from the servants; in others by those interested in having fraudulent names inserted on the list. In districts made up largely of lodging houses, furnishedroom houses, houses of ill-fame and tenements, the names are usually supplied by the proprietors. In many instances forty, fifty and sixty voters are registered from such places and the burden of correction is placed on the public. I recall one house in the Thirteenth Ward where, during a recent canvass, fifteen names were furnished to the assessor by the proprietor, although an examination of the premises disclosed that there were accommodations for but six people and that on the day of assessment the proprietor advertised rooms to let! As the assessment is intended to disclose the bona fide voters of a division or district and as residence is one of the qualifications of a voter, the fraud in this case becomes at once apparent.

An actual canvass of the eighteenth division of the Thirteenth Ward prior to the election of November 6, 1900, disclosed that there were thirty-five names assessed from the house 307 North Ninth street, though traces could be found of but nine residents. From the house 309 North Ninth street twenty-three names were registered, of whom traces of four only could be found. From the four houses, 307, 309, 311

and 313 North Ninth street, there were eighty-two voters assessed, of whom only twenty-one could be found.

As illustrating the looseness of the system of registration prevailing in Philadelphia the following instance is given: Canvassers as they went through a district, and called at the various houses, asked if certain well-known politicians lived there. As those who attended the door had been previously instructed to answer "Yes" to every inquiry as to voters in the house, it was found that the Director of Public Safety, Abraham L. English, was, according to the testimony of those of whom the inquiry was made, the resident of six or eight houses in the same division; as was General Frank Reeder, the chairman of the Republican State Committee, and other prominent politicians.

The following experience, gathered in a previous campaign, is illustrative to the same end: With sealed envelopes addressed to the names upon the assessors' lists, canvassers went to suspected houses and inquired for the assessed voters. They found that the people of whom they made inquiries had been posted to answer that the supposed voters lived there. The residents of the houses where fraudulent names were registered were easily trapped by such a series of questions as this: "Does George D. Baker live here?" "Yes." "Does I. W. Durham live here?" "Yes."

"Does Charles F. Warwick live here?" "Yes." ''Does John Hogan live here?" “Yes.”

Why, you are delib

erately falsifying," was Hogan's reply. "I am John Hogan; George D. Baker lives in the east end of the ward; George S. Graham is the district attorney and lives in the Twenty-ninth ward; Mr. Durham lives in the Seventh Ward and Charles F. Warwick is the mayor," etc. This announcement was sufficient to end the interview and to reveal the fraud that had been practiced. Hogan met just such experiences as this in three-fourths of the places visited.1 Some two or three years ago an examination of the

1 The Arena, October, 1900.

assessors' lists in one of the divisions of the Fifth Ward disclosed that the house 521 Lisbon street, which was at the corner of Hurst street, and was also known as 511 Hurst street, had thirty-two names registered from it; sixteen names from 521 Lisbon street and sixteen names from 511 Hurst street, although the house only consisted of three small rooms, about 12 x 12, one on top of another.

A canvasser in the Eighth Ward called my attention not long since to the fact that the ingenuity of the assessors in inventing fraudulent names had evidently been exhausted, as the list contained quite a number of names given in one order and the same names given in a reverse order. The intelligence of this assessor was not quite up to that of another Eighth Ward assessor, who two or three years ago, under stress for names, assessed a pug dog under the name of "William Rifle." A canvass of forty-one houses in the Tenth and Thirteenth Wards prior to the election of November 6, 1900, disclosed that of 316 names on the list but 128 were genuine. Testimony of the same kind might be indefinitely adduced from such wards as the Third, Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth, Tenth, Eleventh, Thirteenth, Fourteenth and Sixteenth, which are known in local political circles as "police wards.”

If the returns of the assessors in Philadelphia are correct the time-honored ratio of one voter to every five of population will have to be abandoned, that is, if the recent census taken in Philadelphia is to be relied upon, as I presume it is. An examination of the census returns for the fortyone wards of Philadelphia discloses that the city's total population is 1,293,697. The May assessment, taken at or about the same time that the census figures were gathered, shows 320,422 names on the assessors' list or one vote to every 4.037 of population. In many wards the ratio fell as low as I to 2.75 and only in three of the forty-one did it exceed one to five. If the returns of the assessors are correct and if the

ratio of one to five holds good, the population of Philadelphia should be 1,670,445.

These facts in regard to registration suggest an inquiry as to the purpose of this wholesale padding of assessors' lists. In the first place, it furnishes the machine with an opportunity for repeating, the padded names being voted on by the repeaters. Not long since one man was convicted of repeating and admitted that he had voted thirty-eight times at the November election of 1898, and another admitted that he had voted thirty-three times on the same occasion. Secondly, it increases the councilmanic representation, the law providing that each ward shall have one common councilman for every 2,000 assessed voters. Thirdly, it furnishes names for fraudulent assessors and election officers. It was disclosed in the now notorious case of Commonwealth v. Salter et al., that certain fraudulent names were put on the ballot and voted for and elected at one election. At the succeeding election the places of these names were taken by imported scoundrels who stuffed the ballot box to the extent of two hundred votes.

The following statement, taken from an editorial of one of the leading papers in Philadelphia, shows the value of this fraudulent padding of the list. These are the facts brought out in court in the case of Commonwealth v. Hogan et al.:

"That the assessor of the division kept a house of prostitution. "That he had padded his list with fraudulent names registered from his house.

"That two of the names used as election officers were assessed from his house.

"That he was already under a criminal charge for like frauds as

assessor.

"That a burglar only a month out of prison acted as an election officer under the name of one of the regular officers.

"That this burglar had formerly lived in the assessor's house and had been registered therefrom.

"That the constable of the division likewise kept a disreputable