28 



ARKANSAS. 



classes, we demand that personal property to the 

 value of at least three hundred dollars be exempted 

 from taxation. 



9. We believe it to be the duty of the next Gen- 

 eral Assembly to propose such an amendment to the 

 constitution as will reduce the number of judges of 

 the Supreme Court of the State from five to three. 



10. We believe the law creating the office of Com- 

 missioner of Immigration -and State Land should be 

 repealed, and that the duties of this office should be 

 devolved upon the Commissioner of Public Works 

 and Internal Improvements. 



11. We demand of the Legislature the passage of 

 a law submitting to the people the election of all 

 officers, State, county, and township, not prohibited 

 by the constitution, and that an election for such 

 officers be fixed at the earliest practicable day. 



12. We demand, also, the passage of a law pro- 

 hibiting collectors and treasurers from, either direct- 

 ly or indirectly, buying or of being interested in the 

 purchase of any scrip, warrants, or public securities, 

 by them in their official capacity, and that the same 

 funds collected from the people shall be turned over 

 to the State and county treasuries, under penalty of 

 forfeiture of office, and other adequate pecuniary pen- 

 alties. 



13 We are in favor of so amending the laws that 

 the fees now received by salaried State officers shall 

 be paid into the State Treasury ; and we further favor 

 such a reduction of salaries and fees of all officers as 

 will be commensurate with the service required and 

 the labor performed. 



14. The management of the penitentiary is a sub- 

 ject of endless vexation in most States of the Union, 

 and we will favor the enactment of any law that will 

 render it self-sustaining, or save the State Treasury 

 from such depletion as it has suffered under the 

 present law, or that under which it was managed 

 when the present State government went into oper- 

 ation. 



15. ^We are in favor of an amendment to the con- 

 stitution reducing the exemption now established 

 therein to an amount of real and personal property 

 consistent with the protection of the unfortunate and 

 the safety of commercial transactions. 



16. We shall demand of the next General Assem- 

 bly a strict and impartial investigation into all al- 

 leged fraud and corruption, and will especially de- 

 mand a thorough investigation of the means used in 

 procuring the enactment of the law providing for the 

 funding of the Holford bonds, whereby the State 

 was burdened with a disputed debt to an amount 

 equal to one million dollars. 



On the 24th of August the three Central 

 Committees representing the organizations 

 opposed to the Republican party held a joint 

 meeting and endeavored to agree upon a com- 

 mon ticket. The Liberal Republican Commit- 

 tee refused to accept the ticket already adopted 

 by the two other organizations, and on the 

 1st of October prepared an address to the 

 people, in which they put forth the following 

 ticket: For Governor, Andrew Hunter; for 

 Lieutenant-Governor, J. C. Toppan; for Sec- 

 retary of State, J. M. Johnson; for Auditor, 

 W. R. Miller ; for Treasurer, Thomas Boles ; 

 for Attorney-General, F. W. Compton; for 

 Superintendent of Education, L. J. Joyner; 

 for Superintendent of the Penitentiary, R. G. 

 Jennings; for Supreme Court Judges, J. J. 

 Clendenin, and J. D. Walker , for Congress- 

 man at large, James M. Pomeroy. 



Owing to the disaffections in the Democrat- 

 ic party which had sprung out of the accept- 

 ance of the ticket headed by Joseph E. Brooks, 



the Democratic Committee immediately issued 

 an address in favor of accepting this new 

 ticket of the Liberal Republicans in place of 

 that indorsed by the convention of June 19th. 

 The party which had originally nominated 

 the Brooks ticket was incensed at this, and 

 refused to cooperate with the Democrats in 

 local organizations, or to modify in any way 

 its own nominations. This induced the Dem- 

 ocratic Committee to issue another address on 

 the 10th of October, withdrawing the new 

 ticket, and stating at length the reasons for so 

 doing. At the conclusion of this address they 

 said: "We earnestly appeal to our friends and 

 fellow-citizens, who are favorable to the adop- 

 tion of measures of true reform by the law- 

 making power of the State, to come back to 

 the original plan of the party, as adopted in 

 convention, and be sure, whenever they can, 

 to elect members of our own party to seats in 

 the General Assembly. To the General As- 

 sembly we must look as our only hope of re- 

 lief. If disaster arises to us from any other 

 course, by whomsoever adopted, let the sin 

 of it be upon their heads, and not upon ours, 

 whose counsels we shall point to with pride 

 that they have been offered, although they 

 may have been rejected." 



A question arose before the election as to 

 what persons were entitled to registration. 

 The Governor, in reply to inquiries on the 

 subject, declared that he was satisfied that the 

 act entitled u An act regulating elections in 

 this State, and the mode of ascertaining who 

 are entitled to vote at said elections," pub- 

 lished among the statutes of 18V1, " was not 

 passed in accordance with the provisions of 

 the constitution of the State, and therefore is 

 not law." "In view of this," he said, "the 

 registration will be made, and the election 

 conducted, under the law of 1868." He also 

 decided, with the sanction of the Attorney- 

 General, that those who were disfranchised by 

 the fourteenth amendment of the Federal Con- 

 stitution, and whose disabilities had been sub- 

 sequently removed by acts of Congress, were 

 not entitled to registration, under the State 

 constitution. When that constitution was 

 formed, the fourteenth amendment had not 

 been ratified by the requisite number of States, 

 and a clause was introduced depriving several 

 classes of the right to vote among them, 

 " those who may be disqualified by the pro- 

 posed amendment of the Constitution of the 

 United States known as Article XIV." Ac- 

 cording to the decision of the Governor and the 

 Attorney-General, the subsequent removal of 

 disabilities did not restore the right to vote to 

 these classes without a change in the State 

 constitution. This position was regarded as 

 erroneous by many, but it was adhered to by 

 the Governor in his instructions to registrars. 



The election occurred on the 6th of Novem- 

 ber, and, according to the returns, as officially 

 made, the total vote for presidential electors 

 was 79,000, of which those for Grant and Wil- 



