cast, no other eligible candidate was voted for. The Senate refused to give him the seat. (Forty-second Congress: Senate Report, No. 58.) In 1824 John Bailey, elected to the House of Representatives from Massachusetts, was found to be disqualified, but his competitor was not allowed to take the place.

There are cases holding directly that when the candidate receiving the highest number of votes, is ineligible from a fact or cause which the public do not and are not bound to know, the result is a failure, and gives no candidate the office. Examples of cases wherein the voters may not be held as having knowledge, are the infancy of the candidate, non-residence, want of naturalization and non-existence. In a case reported in Maine, a portion of the people voted by mistake for a person not in being. It was held that there was a vacancy.1

In this connection we may note here the case of State ex rel. Schuet v. Murray, 28 Wisconsin, 496, which decided that though a person is ineligible when voted for, he

1. Opinion of court, 38 Maine (appendix,) 597. The case was this: Among the returns made to the governer and council was one reporting votes for Abel C. Winslow. A certificate was accordingly made out in that name. It turned out that there was no such person as Abel C Winslow, but that there was an Abel E. Winslow. The opinion of the court was asked, and was given to the effect that the governor and council could do nothing more than certify to the election of such person as appeared by the returns to have been elected; that they could not take testimony to show that Abel E. and not Abel C. was the name of the candidate voted for, and upon that issue a new commission to the former, nor could they turn out returns shown to have been made for a person not in existence, and issue a commission to the eligible candidate; and that in such a case, the issued certificate having no application, there was a vacancy, and the governor might fill it.

may enter upon and hold the office if the ineligibility ceases or is removed before the term of the office begins. The principle was declared to be that the disqualification does not relate to the election, but to the holding of the office.1

1. See post., chapter Aliens and Naturalization.

CHAPTER VII.

REGISTRATION LAWS.

In some of the states special provision is made in the constitution for the enactment of registration laws by the legislature,1 in others the making of the registration of the voters a prerequisite to the right to vote, is forbidden,2 and in one registration laws are absolutely prohibited.3

In states whose constitutions are silent, laws of this character have been enacted as a part of the system. regulating elections, and have given rise to litigation. The obvious conclusion has been that the legislature

1. See constitution of: Alabama, Art. III, Sec. 5; Colorado, Art. VII, Sec. 11; Florida, Art. XV, Sec. 1; Georgia, Art. II, Sec. 6; Kansas, Art. V, Sec. 4; Kentucky, (by implication?) Art. VIII, Sec. 4; Louisiana, (by implication?) title VI, articles 99 and 103; Maryland, Art. I, Sec. 5; Michigan, (by implication?) Art. VII, Sec. 6; Mississippi, Art. VII, Sec. 3; Missouri, Art. VIII, Sec. 5; Nevada, Art. II, Sec. 6; and with special reference to persons in the military and naval service, Sec. 2; New York, (by implication?) Art. II, Sec. 4; North Carolina, Art. VI, Sec. 2; Oregon, (by implication?) Art. II, Sec. 8; Pennsylvania, Art. VIII, Sec. 7; Rhode Island, Art. II, Sec. 6; South Carolina, Art. 8, Sec. 3; Tennessee, (by implication) Art. IV, Sec. 1; Virginia, Art. III, Sec. 4; West Virginia, (by implication) Art. IV, Sec. 11, but see section 12.

2. Constitution of Arkansas, Art. III, Sec. 2; Nevada, as to persons in the military and naval service, Art. II, Sec. 2; Pennsylvania, Art. VIII, Sec. 7; West Virginia, Art. IV, Sec. 12.

3. Constitution of Texas, Art. VI, Sec. 4.

cannot add anything to the qualifications prescribed by the constitution of the state. In Monroe v. Collins, 17 Ohio St. 665, it is very properly said, that legislation should be to facilitate rather than impede the right of suffrage. "Between the legislative power and the legal elector, no matter who or what he is, the constitutional provision stands, as a bulwark, for the protection of his right to vote. What the legislature cannot do directly, it cannot do by indirection. If it has no power expressly to deny or take away the right, it has none to define it away, or unreasonably to abridge or impede its enjoyment by laws professing to be merely remedial. The power of the legislature in such cases is limited to laws. regulating the enjoyment of the right, by facilitating its lawful exercise and preventing its abuse."1

It is, accordingly, held that a law which alters, adds to or abridges the constitutional qualification of a voter is void. A decision in New Jersey, where the constitution provides that every male citizen of the United States, who

1. In the case cited, the court added: "All reasonable latitude should be allowed to the legislature in the exercise of this power of registration, and every reasonable intendment in favor of the constitutionality of laws enacted for that purpose, should be made by the courts. Such laws are not to be held unconstitutional unless clearly so, and if they will at all bear a construction which makes them consistent with the constitution, they are to receive that construction, and so to be upheld. The true line between laws which take away or abridge the right of suffrage, and those which may be lawfully enacted to regulate its exercise, is laid down by the Supreme Court of Massachusetts in Capen v. Foster, 12 Pick., 488. It was there held, substantially, that laws of the latter description must be reasonable, uniform, and impartial, and must be calculated to facilitate and secure rather than to subvert or impede the exercise of the right to vote.”

2. See 7 Nevada Rep., 64, and cases cited hereafter.

has resided in the state one year and in the county where he offers to vote five months, shall be entitled to vote, but where the registry law closes the registration some days in advance of the election, and provides that the vote of no one whose name is not on the list shall be received, would seem to be inconsistent with the principle stated. That principle has, in other states, been broadly asserted. Thus it is held in North Carolina that the suffrage guaranteed by the constitution of a state is a right to be exercised in any part of it, and that the legislature cannot in any way change the qualifications of voters in state, county, township, city or town. (The People of North Carolina ex rel. Van Bokkelen and others v. Wm. P. Canaly and others, 73 North Carolina, 198.) An act of the legislature provided that no person should be entitled to registration [that being a prerequisite to voting] in Wilmington who had not resided ninety days next preceding the election in the lot, block and ward. The provision was pronounced unconstitutional.1

* * *

1. The Supreme Court said: "Our government is founded on the will of the people. Their will is expressed by the ballot. The constitution provides that every male person twenty-one years old, resident in the state twelve months, and in the county thirty days, shall be an elector. -Art. VI., sec. 1. An elector for what? The constitution does not say for what. Does it mean elector for president, or for members of congress, or for governor, or for judges, or for members of the general assembly, or for county officers, or for township or town officers, or for what else? There it stands by itself without explanation-that every such person shall be an elector-a voter. It evidently means to designate those persons as a class, to vote generally wherever the polls are opened and elections held for anything connected with the general government, or the state or local governments. * * * Cities and towns, like counties and townships, are parts and parcels of the state organized for the convenience