A Contested Election In California Vs Hon Cn Felton Testimony Of The Qualified Electors And Legal Voters Of New Almaden

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ISBN 13 : 9781332236305
Total Pages : 256 pages
Book Rating : 4.2/5 (363 download)

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Download or read book A Contested Election in California Vs, Hon. C. N. Felton written by and published by . This book was released on 2015-08-05 with total page 256 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Excerpt from A Contested Election in California Vs, Hon. C. N. Felton: Testimony of the Qualified Electors and Legal Voters of New Almaden At the general election held in California, November 2nd, 1886, Hon. Charles N. Felton and Frank J.Sullivan were rival candidates for election as members of Congress in the Fifth Congressional District. The official returns gave to Hon. Charles N. Felton a plurality of 118 votes, and the certificate of election duly issued to him. Sullivan afterwards inaugurated a contest for the seat. In this contest the vote of New Almaden precinct became a very conspicuous part. The majority against Sullivan in that precinct was 164, so that if Sullivan could have that precinct thrown out, or the votes cast for Mr. Felton counted for Mr. Sullivan, he might reasonably expect to unseat Mr. Felton and fill the place himself. The New Almaden precinct is the seat of the great New Almaden Quicksilver Mine, which for many years has been the principal quicksilver producer of the American Continent, and employs about 500 men in all capacities, of whom 156 were voters, and voted at the election in 1886. The total vote of the precinct was 256. The grounds of the attack upon the vote of New Almaden precinct by Sullivan were, that the voters of the precinct were coerced, intimidated, and held in a state of peonage or slavery and compelled to vote for Mr. Felton against their will. In support of this he attacked the method of conducting the mine, the system of trade at the mine, and the general condition of the miners; claiming that those who did not vote as pleased the management of the mine would be discharged. On behalf of Sullivan the testimony relating to Almaden was almost entirely hearsay so far as it could be in any sense pertinent to the issue; being generally a statement by witnesses that they had heard, or "it was generally understood" that so and so had happened at Almaden. On behalf of Mr. Felton a large amount of evidence was taken, very much of it at New Almaden. Of the 256 persons who had voted in that precinct in 1886, 243 were personally examined, the other 13 being dead or having removed to a distance, or for other reasons their attendance as witnesses being impracticable. Of the number examined there was not one but what testified in the clearest terms, that for more, than fifteen years past the subject of voting, or candidates, or elections had never been mentioned to any employee of the Company by any one in any way connected with the management of the mine; that the Superintendent of the mine was the only person in the precinct who voted the American ticket in 1886. That the voting employees of the mine consist very largely of natives of Mexico and Cornwall, England, who here, as elsewhere in California, vote the Republican ticket almost exclusively. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.