There is, besides this, a power lodged in a certain council of state and president,—for this state is a republic,—to dissolve the house and appoint a general election. In all the states there is a house of representatives, constituted substantially on the same principle. In their designations, and in some points of detail, there are several differences.
In the election of members all citizens have, in most of the states, a vote, though not all equal votes. Any citizen, who is unconvicted of any crime, of sound mind, and of a certain specified age, (in the state of Bath it is thirty-five,) is entitled to be enrolled as a voter, on producing a certificate of his having gone through a certain course of elementary school-learning, and attained the required proficiency. He is then entitled to what is called a personal vote; i. e. a vote without any reference to the amount of his property. In Bath, and some of the other states, an individual may have conferred on him the honour and privilege of a double or treble personal vote, in consideration of peculiar public services or personal qualifications.
Besides this, each individual who may pay a certain proportion of taxes,—i. e. who may possess a certain amount of taxable property,—is entitled, on that ground, to a property-vote;[[3]] if he has a certain greater amount specified,—which is more, however, than double the first,—he has a second property-vote; and so on, up to a certain limited number. In the republic of Bath, six is the utmost number of property-votes that one person can hold; but this varies in the several states; the distinction of personal and property-votes, and the power of holding more than one of the latter, are regulations common to all.
[3]. Any property not taxable,—as, for instance, professional income,—the holder may, if he think fit, enroll as equivalent to so much land, and pay taxes accordingly, which entitles him to a corresponding number of votes.
“This part of our system,” Mr. Adamson remarked to them, “is not so much unlike that of Great Britain as you had at the first glance conceived: for with you, if a man chance to have landed property in several different counties, he is entitled to a vote in each; and this is nearly equivalent to his having several votes in one county, should all the property chance to be in that one. The anomaly is with you; in giving one man more direct influence in the election of the legislature than another, who, perhaps, has double his estate, but all within one county. I say,” continued he, “direct influence; because, indirectly, a rich man among you does, it appears, influence his tenants, tradesmen, and other dependents in their votes. With us, the weight which property has, and ought to have, is allowed to operate directly and openly: with you, on the system of single votes, it does not.
“And accordingly you apprehend, I find, a danger in the threatened introduction of the ballot; as tending to place the richest and poorest on a footing of democratical equality, by taking away the indirect influence of the one over the votes of the other. And it is remarkable that the tendency of the ballot to produce this effect,—which is manifestly the great danger to be apprehended from it,—seems to be asserted by its advocates among you, and denied by its opponents. With us, on the contrary, there is no such consequence to be apprehended; and, accordingly, our voting for representatives is always by ballot. On our system, this is not only unobjectionable but highly important; for, as the successful candidate is elected by the majority of votes, while it is possible that his opponent might be supported by a much greater number of voters, it would be very inexpedient to let this be publicly displayed and recorded; as it might tend to array the wealthier and poorer classes against each other.
“On the whole,” added he, “our system seems to be the simplest and most effectual for preserving that principle which must be maintained in every good representative system; viz. that persons and property should both be represented. The democrat aims at a representation of persons alone; at putting on a political level those who have the largest stake in the country, and those who have little or none. The aristocrat (or rather, oligarchist) is for representing property alone; as if the taxes imposed by the legislature towards the expenses of the state were everything, and the life and liberty of individuals, which may be affected by the laws passed, were nothing. The true wisdom, surely, is to take both into account, and to provide that both persons and property shall be duly represented.”
In all the states but one, all persons are eligible to a seat in the lower house,—that of representatives,—who possess certain property and personal qualifications. In that one,—the kingdom of Upper-London, a small state, which was separated, above a hundred years since, from that of Nether-London,—a sort of hereditary restriction exists, which, at the first glance, appeared to the travellers exceedingly whimsical. No one is eligible to their commons’ assembly who is not descended, or married to one who is, from both blacks and whites.
The origin of the regulation was this:—Before the state was separated, the district which constitutes its present territory was occupied by a considerable proportion of blacks, viz. the descendants of the allied and reclaimed aboriginals formerly described. It was observed by the then king of Nether-London, (then called New-London,) that the whites of pure blood were beginning to hold aloof, not only from the blacks, but from those of mixed breed, and to disdain associating with them on equal terms, however personally deserving. To remedy this state of things, and prevent a mutual alienation between two sets of fellow-citizens, the king,—who seems to have inherited something of the eccentric, original, and daring character of the younger Müller, from a daughter of whom he was descended,—devised the plan, which, with the concurrence of the legislature, he carried into effect, for constituting this district—a thriving and, in other respects, promising one—into a distinct state, under some peculiar regulations.