Ill 
THE DIRECT PRIMARY IN OPERATION 
For the purpose of ascertaining the facts concerning the 
actual operation of the direct primary in Maine data have been 
collected to answer, if possible, the following questions : 
First: Has the primary given undue advantage to city 
candidates and deprived the country of its just representation 
in state and county offices? 
Second : What has been the effect of the primary upon the 
number of candidates? 
Third: Has it substituted plurality for majority nomina- 
tions? 
Fourth: What effect has it had upon party organization 
and party harmony? 
Fifth : What has been its effect upon the quality of officers 
chosen? 
Sixth: Has the direct primary made it more expensive to 
run for office? 
Seventh: Has the cost of the direct primary to the state 
and municipalities been excessive? 
Eighth: What has been the effect of the direct primary 
upon popular interest in nominations? 
In regard to the first question, the Portland Evening Ex- 
press and Advertiser maintains that it has favored city candi- 
dates. The “direct primary plan’’, it says, . . invari- 
ably gives the city candidate an advantage over the country 
candidate”, since “a voter will almost certainly support a man 
from his own town.”®^ The same view is expressed by the 
Bangor Daily Commercials^ Such a result was predicted on 
the floor of the Senate when the bill was before the legisla- 
ture. The statement that the city candidate has an undue ad- 
vantage has been repeated so often and widely that it has 
been accepted almost as an axiom. 
In order to discover the facts, the writer has made a study 
of the distribution of county officers and state senators be- 
tween the cities and country towns in the eight counties hav- 
ing important urban centers for six biennial periods since the 
Portland Evening Express and Advertiser, November 14 and 24, 1922. 
Bangor Daily Commercial, November 15 and 25, 1922. 
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