publish the same not less than three clear days
before the day fixed for the election.

No public-house may be used for a polling
station, or for the purpose of an election.

13. If the borough is divided into wards or polling districts, each voter must give his vote in the ward or polling district in which the property in respect of which he is entitled to vote is situate, and if it is situate in more than one, in any one in which it is situate.

14. The returning officer, or some person or persons appointed by him for this purpose, is to preside at each polling station, provided that only one person may preside at the same time.

15. The poll is to be in a borough, and in any school district with more than 15,000 population, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. In a district with less than 15,000 the poll is to be open from 12 noon tc 8 p.m.

16. Subject to the provisions of the orders, the poll is to be taken in like manner as a poll at a contested municipal election is directed by the Ballot Act, 1872, to be taken; and subject as aforesaid the provisions of that Act are to apply to the election in like manner as if they were contained in the orders, with the substitution of the term "school board election" for the term "municipal election:" provided that :

(a) Every voter is to be entitled to a number of votes equal to the number of the members of the school board to be elected, and may give all such votes to one candidate, or may distribute them amongst the candidates, as he thinks fit.

(b) The voterm ay place against the name of any candidate for whom he votes the number of votes he gives to such candidate in lieu of a cross,

Department, nor one for every 1,000 voters in a parish, see Circular of the Education Department of the 17th June, 1886.

SCHOOL
BOARD.

SCHOOL
BOARD.

and the form of directions for the guidance of the voter in voting, contained in the Ballot Act, 1872, are to be altered accordingly.

(c) The provisions of sections 3, 4, 11 and 24 of the Ballot Act, 1872, are to be deemed to be regulations contained in these Orders, which involve a penalty within the meaning of section 90 of the Elementary Education Act, 1870 (b). 17. The person presiding at the poll may, and if required by any two voters is to, put to any voter at the time of his applying for a ballot paper, but not afterwards, the following questions, or one of them, but no other :

(1) Are you the person whose name appears as A. B. in the book containing the rate made on the and rated therein for the

day of

property described as

property in rate book) (c).

? (Specify date and

(2) Have you already voted at the present election?

And no person required to answer any of the said questions shall be permitted or qualified to vote until he has answered the same.

As to the liabilities of a returning officer for rejecting a voter, see ante, p. 44.

21. Notices and other matters required by these regu

lations to be published, are, in a borough, to be published in like manner as in the case of the election of councillors, and in a parish in like manner as public notices are usually published in the parishes to which they relate.

The Education Department has issued a circular

(b) Section 90 is as follows:-If any person attempts to obstruct or prevent any election, or wilfully contravenes any regulation, the contravention of which is expressed to involve a penalty, he shall upon summary conviction be liable to a penalty of 507., and in default of payment to imprisonment for not more than six months.

(c) In a borough or united district the first question must be varied accordingly.

(17th June, 1886) prohibiting the publication of notices in any newspaper. If published, this expense will be disallowed.

Subject to the above regulations the poll is conducted, as before stated, in like manner as the poll at a municipal election, which has been treated of earlier in this chapter.

By 47 & 48 Vict. c. 70, s. 36, the provisions of that Act and of Part IV. of 45 & 46 Vict. c. 50 are applied to school board elections.

SCHOOL
BOARD.

MUNICIPAL AND COUNTY COUNCILS.

MUNICIPAL and county council elections are treated of together, because a county council and its members are, by section 2 of the Local Government Act, 1888 (51 & 52 Vict. c. 41), to be constituted and elected, and be in the like position in all respects, as the council of a borough divided into wards, subject to certain provisions. And by section 75, the portions of the Municipal Corporations Act, 1882 (45 & 46 Vict. c. 50), which deal with the procedure after election, are inter alia incorporated, and apply as if re-enacted, with such modifications as are necessary. The effect of these sections is that the elections of chairmen, county aldermen, and county councillors are subject substantially to the same provisions as those to which the elections of mayors, aldermen, and councillors are subject in municipal boroughs. In order to save needless repetition, express reference will only be made to county councils when the provisions applicable to them differ from those applicable to municipal councils. It must be understood, therefore, that the provisions expressed to be applicable

AND

COUNCILS.

to municipal elections apply also to county council elec- MUNICIPAL tions, except where the contrary is stated; in applying COUNTY such provisions to county council elections the necessary modifications and amendments must be made, as to which see ante, p. 32.

The provisions of the Ballot Act, 1872 (35 & 36 Vict. c. 33), relating to a poll at a parliamentary election, and to the duties of a returning officer after the close of the poll, apply, with certain exceptions, to a poll at a municipal election of councillors (a): 45 & 46 Vict. c. 50, s. 58 (1).

of votes.

It is provided by section 2 of 35 & 36 Vict. c. 33, that Counting after the close of the poll the ballot boxes must be sealed up so as to prevent the introduction of additional ballot papers, and taken charge of by the returning officer, who, in the presence of the agents, is to open the ballot boxes and ascertain the result of the poll by counting the votes given for each candidate, and is forthwith to declare the result of the election accordingly.

It is provided by the rules contained in the First Schedule to 35 & 36 Vict. c. 33, that as soon as practicable after the close of the poll the presiding officer at each station is to deliver to the returning officer(1) The ballot boxes, containing the ballot papers placed therein at the election, including those protested against for personation, and those marked by the presiding officer, under the head of "physical incapacity," "Jews," or "unable to read";

(2) The tendered ballot papers;

(3) The spoilt and unused ballot papers;

(4) The marked copies of the register and counterfoils of the ballot papers;

(a) These provisions did not formerly apply to municipal elections within the City of London (which were regulated by various charters, customs and statutes), but are now applied by section 3 of the City of London Ballot Act, 1887 (50 Vict. c. xiii), subject to the modifications contained in that Act, post, p. 491.