The laws providing that no pre-election promises shall be made, Financial and that no one may give or receive money for personal assistance protection. in the campaign, have a salutary effect. It is a great protection to the candidate to say that he cannot give money or make promises for any assistance. It relieves him of the incubus of the ward heeler and the political grafter. ... The ability and character of the men who are finally successful Able men

chosen on in the election is very good. Only men of superior ability and fair

the nonrepute, who are able to contend before 20,000 voters and undergo partisan

ballot. their scrutiny, can be successful.

been put

207. Adequate representation of the majority How can we make certain that an individual nominated or elected to secure represents a majority of those voting? When there are only two the adequate

representacandidates, the one receiving the larger number of votes receives tion of the both a plurality and a majority, but when there are several candi- majority,

the preferdates, the victor may have received the sanction of only a small ential voting

device has minority of those voting. This means that the chosen official

represents a minority, and that the majority are not adequately repre- forward. sented. To remedy this defect, several devices have been suggested, among them the preferential ballot. How one type of preferential voting works is explained by Mr. Reginald Mott Hull in the following passage:

In the method of voting proposed in Cambridge [Mass.,] any The fifty voters could secure a place on the final ballot for the name of proposed

Cambridge their nominee for any elective office. Election is by the city at plan inlarge, to a highly paid, conspicuous position for a three year term,

cluded pro

vision for a with no party designation, no primary, and, after the first year, with short and never more than two offices in the city council to be filled annually. non-partisan

ballot. Every candidate stands on his own feet,'— no boss dictates who shall, or shall not run. The man who can survive this test must win on his own merit, and not merely drift into office on a party label unknown to most of his fellow citizens.

The preferential ballot enables the voters of the city in one elec

The prefer- tion to arrive at a majority choice irrespective of the number of ential ballot candidates, provided there is anyone in the list of candidates acmakes possible a ma- ceptable to a majority. If there is none such in the list, it is obviously jority choice,

not the fault of the preferential ballot. Besides, we get the next or at least a legitimate best thing and the only thing possible with such a list of nominees, plurality

a legitimate plurality election; i.e. a plurality election based on a choice.

full and free expression of choice by the voters in place of the customary one in which a voter with only one choice must vote against all the candidates but one, though there may be several excellent

names in the list. How the The modern preferential ballot is arranged like the ordinary preferential

Australian ballot, except that instead of one column for crosses there ballot is arranged. are three provided, headed “first choice,” “second choice,” and “other

choices” respectively. The voter places a cross in the first column after the name of his first choice for that office, and in the second column after the name of his second choice. If there are others acceptable, and still others quite undesirable, the voter will place a cross after all the other acceptable men in the third column. This means that he not only has the opportunity to vote for all the good

men, but also thus against all the undesirable ones. How the If some candidate polls a majority of all the votes in the first successful candidate is

column, he is elected.' Failing that, the first and second choice ascertained. votes are added together/ The candidate, now highest, wins, if he

has a majority. If no man can command a majority of the firsts and seconds, meaning that there are a number of nearly equally desirable candidates, the choices in the third column are now added in. The highest man then wins whether he has a majority or not for he is the man on the list behind whom the greatest number of voters are found to have gathered after each has specified all whom he cares to support.

This will always result in a majority election, unless the list of candidates happens to contain no one on whom the majority can

freely and automatically unite. Evils of

Under our present system the voter can vote for but one man whatthe present system.

ever the number of good or bad candidates, and the chances are that the undesirable man will win, because the machine can prevent the scattering of its vote among a lot of nominees, whereas, if the citizens

had a real opportunity for free expression, a large majority might have gotten together behind some independent candidate.

For instance, one man was elected mayor of a Massachusetts An example. city about a year ago by 1800 votes out of 7200; the 5400 other votes being divided nearly equally among four other candidates. The primary partisan system to prevent such mishaps has to choke off, in the interest of harmony, desirable candidates, in order not to risk a party defeat through a split ticket. ... The present system necessitates the expenditure of large sums How pref

erential of money and a great deal of time and energy to be nominated or

voting imelected. Under the preferential system no money or time need be proves upon

the present expended in campaigns. A man can be elected on his reputation as

system. is shown by the fact that the president of the Chamber of Commerce was elected to the Spokane city council during his absence from the city.

208. Adequate representation of the minority 1 Related to the question of making sure that successful candidates The aderepresent a majority of those voting, is the problem of the adequate quate repre

sentation representation of the minority. To meet this last-named difficulty of the political reformers have put forth various plans for proportional minority. representation. These are designed to give minority parties representation in proportion to their voting strength. One of the earliest and best known forms of proportional representation is that applied in Illinois in 1870 in the effort to give minority parties adequate representation in the state legislature. The following passage describes the plan in use in Illinois: [The law provides] that “in all elections of representatives afore- Framework

of the said, each qualified voter may cast as many votes for one candidate

Illinois plan as there are representatives to be elected, or may distribute the of proporsame, or equal parts thereof, among the candidates, as he shall sce

resentation. fit; and the candidates highest in votes shall be declared elected.” Under this plan it is of course true that any party having more than one-fourth of the votes in a senatorial district may elect one of the

tional rep

a

Importance
of each
party
gauging
its own
strength.

three candidates to the House of Representatives, if all of the votes of that party are concentrated upon one such candidate. A party having less than three-fourths of the votes in a senatorial district cannot elect all three of the representatives from the district if any other party

at least one-fourth of the votes has concentrated upon a single candidate; and if a party having a distinct majority, but less than three-fourths of the votes in a senatorial district, scatters its votes among three candidates, a minority party may be able to elect two candidates by a concentration of its votes upon the two.

The cumulative system therefore makes it necessary that each party gauge its strength in advance of the election, and concentrate its votes in the election upon the number of candidates it thinks possible to elect. A minority party able actually to elect but one candidate may lose that one if it places two or three candidates in the field. The majority party able to elect two may lose one of the two if it places three in the field, and there have been some instances of a party failing to obtain under the cumulative system a representation in proportion to its strength, because of its placing too many candidates in the field. On the other hand, a party may fail of obtaining representation of its strength under the cumulative system because of its failure to have as many candidates as it could actually elect. That is, a party which has been a minority party in a district may place but one candidate in the field for representative, and

may as the result of the particular election become the majority party with a possibility of electing two members of the house, if it had nominated two candidates.

With respect to the operation of the cumulative system, it may perhaps be said that the system has in the main obtained

representation for the two principal parties in the state in very close proportion to the actual votes cast by these parties, and also that the system obtained for the Progressive party in 1912 a strength in the House of Representatives proportionate to the vote cast by that party.

However, the cumulative system has not obtained much of actual representation for weak minority parties, or for minority parties whose strength may be relatively great, but whose vote may be scattered somewhat evenly throughout all of the senatorial districts in

The device
secured
proportional
representa-
tion for
the two
principal
parties

the state. The Progressive party in 1912 cast a large vote, but its strength was much greater in some senatorial districts than in others. The Progressive party was, therefore, able in 1912 to elect a number of representatives proportional to the popular vote which was cast for representatives. In 1914, however, the actual vote cast for representatives by the Progressive party was much less than in 1912, and with this lesser vote the Progressive party obtained a strength in the House of Representatives disproportionately low as compared with the popular vote.

The same situation has presented itself with respect to other but small minority parties, which have not obtained such a strength as to be- minority

parties have come substantially the chief minority party in particular districts. continued The cumulative system in its operation has been in no way a scheme to suffer

from lack of proportional representation except as between the two principal of represenparties. . . . Perhaps the main purpose in the adoption of cumu

tation. lative voting in 1870 was to do away with the distinctly sectional representation in the Illinois General Assembly, and this purpose has been accomplished. . . However, small parties have as a rule suffered from lack of representation and the cumulative system has been of little or no aid to them.

.

209. Evils of the long ballot 1 The wave of democracy which swept over the country in the last Increasing century had the effect of increasing the number of elective offices length of

the ballot in American government. A greatly lengthened ballot, together and the with the great frequency of elections, has made it impossible for the result. average voter to exercise proper judgment at the polls. Fairly representative of conditions throughout the United States is the case of Ohio, in which the long ballot was formerly a great evil. In The case 1911 a Short Ballot Committee reported upon conditions in Ohio of Ohio: as follows:

This unsatisfactory and undemocratic development of our election At first appliances has been one of gradual growth. The first constitution

few officials of Ohio, adopted in 1802, incorporated the principle of comparatively elective,