[Footnote A: Illinois, Michigan, Nebraska, New Jersey, West Virginia,
Minnesota, Utah.]
The penalties for bribery range from $5 to $2,000 and from thirty days' to ten years' imprisonment, but only one state (Ohio) provides in definite terms for punishment of bribery as a part of the penalty in an election contest. In most cases proof of bribery does not throw out the vote of briber or bribed, nor does an action to throw out purchased votes in contest cases bring with it automatically punishment of the purchased voter. This omission from the contest provisions presupposes that these bribery cases would be separate actions. Thirty-two states in clear terms disfranchise (or give the Legislature power to disfranchise) bribers and bribed, but few make provision for the method of actually enforcing the law, and upon inquiry the Secretary of State of many of these states reported that, so far as he knew, no man had ever been disfranchised for this offense. This was true of states which have been notorious for political corruption.
From Ohio alone has evidence been found of the actual enforcement of the disfranchisement provision. In this state nearly 1,800 bribed voters of Adams County were disfranchised in 1910 for scandalous and well-remembered corruption but in 1915 they were restored to citizenship. These cases reveal a disgraceful provision in the Ohio law, by which the briber is given immunity if he will turn State's evidence on the bribed; the vote-buyer may purchase votes by the thousands with perfect safety provided that when suspected he will deliver up a few of the bought by way of example.
With a vague, uncertain law to define their punishment in most states, and no law at all in twenty-four states, as a preliminary security, corrupt opponents of a woman suffrage amendment find many additional aids to their nefarious acts. A briber must make sure that the bribed carries out his part of the contract. Whenever it is easy to check up the results of the bribe, corruption may reign supreme with little risk of being found out. A study of some of the recent suffrage votes gives significant food for reflection. It shows how the form, color and arrangement of the ballot may help the corrupt politician to organize ignorant voters to do his will. In Georgia and Louisiana no party names are printed on the official ballot and emblems only are used. In almost half our states, though the party name is used also, the emblem is the real guide. New York does not even relegate this emblem to the top of the column. The emblem is placed before the name of each candidate, so that the illiterate voter can make no mistake in recognizing the sign of the machine which controls his vote. Scarcely more than a dozen states have the headless ballot[A] which makes it impossible for politicians to make corrupt use of the illiterate voter.
[Footnote A: Oregon, Nevada, South Carolina, Florida, Colorado,
California, Maryland, Minnesota, New Jersey, Massachusetts,
Mississippi, Nebraska, Pennsylvania.]
In Wisconsin suffrage referendum the suffrage ballot was separate and pink. It was easy to teach the most illiterate how to vote "No" and to check up returns with considerable accuracy. In New York there were three ballots. The official ballot had emblems which easily distinguished it. The other two were exactly alike in shape, size and color and each contained three propositions: those which came from the constitutional convention and the other those which came from the Legislature. The orders went forth to vote down the constitutional provisions and it was done by a majority of 482,000, or nearly 300,000 more than the majority against woman suffrage. On the ballot containing the suffrage amendment, which was No. 1, there was proposition No. 3, which all the political parties wanted carried and to which no one objected. It could easily be found by all illiterates as it contained more lines of printing, yet so difficult was it to teach ignorant men to vote "Yes" on that one proposition that, despite the fact that orders had gone forth to all the state that No. 3 was to be carried, it barely squeezed through.
In Pennsylvania there are no emblems to distinguish the tickets and on the large ballot the suffrage amendment was difficult to find by an untutored voter. In probable consequence Pennsylvania polled the largest proportional vote for the amendment of any eastern state. In Massachusetts the ballot was small and the suffrage amendment could be easily picked out by a bribed voter. In Iowa the suffrage ballot was separate and yellow while the main ballots were white.
In the North Dakota referendum the regular ballot was long and complicated and the suffrage ballot separate and small. It was easy to teach the dullest illiterate how to vote "No." It might be said that it would be equally easy to teach him to vote "Yes." True, but suffragists never bribe. Both the briber and the illiterate are allies of the opposition.
A referendum on a non-partisan issue has none of the protection accorded a party question. Election boards are bi-partisan and each party has its own machinery, not only of election officials but watchers and challengers, to see that the opposing party commits no fraud. The watchfulness of this party machinery, plus an increasingly vigilant public opinion, has corrected many of the election frauds which were once common and most elections are now probably free from all the baser forms of corruption. When a question on referendum is sincerely espoused by both the dominant parties it has the advantage of the watchfulness of both party machines and is doubly safeguarded from fraud. But when such a question has been espoused by no dominant party it is utterly at the mercy of the worst forms of corruption. The election officers have even been known to wink at irregularities plainly committed since it was no affair of theirs. Or, they may even go further and join in the entertaining game of running in as many votes against such an amendment as possible. This has not infrequently been the unhappy experience of suffrage amendments in corrupt quarters.
Honest election officers, respecting "the will of the majority" as the sovereign of our nation, would protect honesty in elections, regardless of their own or their party's views, but unhappily that high standard is not universal.