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3815 the election, or even a few weeks or any short time prior to the election, politicians will use the privilege of paying it for the purpose of indirectly buying votes; in other words, parties or candidates for office will pay the poll tax of a great number of voters upon condition, express or implied, that the votes are to be cast for their party or for themselves. Wherever a poll-tax provision has existed without some limitation as to the time at which it shall be paid prior to the election that has been the case. Mr. PARKER of New Jersey. May I ask the gentleman a question? Mr. WILLIAMS of Mississippi. The provision of this bill is that the poll tax shall be paid "prior to registration," and the present Hawaiian law fixes the registration about four months prior to the election. But of course that law might be changed at any moment. Moreover, four months is not a long enough time. If you fix it at nine months - a period sufficiently short - then it will tempt no corruptionist in politics to pay the poll taxes of any voter, for the simple reason that the man who is willing to give his vote in consideration of payment of his poll tax is not a man that can be trusted for nine months. He may be bought by the other side after that. We have a provision like that in Mississippi - that is, for the payment of the poll tax of the previous year - and the consequence is that nobody has ever paid the poll tax of anybody else with the hope of buying a vote, or indeed for any purpose. Mr. PARKER of New Jersey. When is the election to be held? How would you make it applicable to elections in the current year? Mr. WILLIAMS of Mississippi. It is the poll tax due nine months before. It makes the poll tax due nine months before payable. Of course no taxes not due at that time could be col- lectible, nor are they brought in question when the voter comes up to vote. Mr. KNOX. The purpose of this provision was to extend to every citizen of Hawaii that could read and write and who resided in the proper district an opportunity to vote, with the sole condition that he shall have paid his poll tax. It was thought not right that a man who had a tax assessed against him, and who should offer to pay it at any time before the close of the registration, should be disfranchised. I suggest to the gentleman from Mississippi that in any State I know of the poll taxes for the current year are not assessed nine months previous to the election. Our taxes are assessed in May, for instance. Mr. WILLIAMS of Mississippi. My amendment does not make the poll tax for the current year the test for his vote; he shall pay the poll tax due nine months before the election, and that would necessarily be the poll tax of the previous year. Mr. KNOX. Then the other language in the section will have to be stricken out, as it refers to the payment of the poll tax for the current year. Now, we do not think that a man who has failed in the past year to pay his poll tax, the year for which they are assessed, is in any better condition; he may have been deprived by sickness or misfortune in the past year from paying his poll tax. Now, if for the very year that he is assessed the poll tax he pays it, I do not think it is just that he should be deprived of his vote. Mr. WILLIAMS of Mississippi. Well, Mr. Chairman, I wish to modify my amendment. I will strike out the word "current," in line 2, page 74, and substitute the word "previous." I did not notice the word "current" in the section. That will cure the trouble. Mr. KNOX. Now, Mr. Chairman, I call for a vote. Mr. UNDERWOOD. Mr. Chairman, I wish to be recognized on the amendment. I think this is an important amendment and one that should be passed. The present bill before the House is virtually making a constitution for Hawaii as long as it remains tinder Territorial form of government, unless altered by Congress. I think it should be the effort of the Congress of the United States, whenever it is possible to do so, to raise the citizenship of this country, to raise the value of the American franchise, whether it is in Hawaii, New York, or Alabama. I think that only those persons should be entitled to vote who have shown themselves qualified to exercise the right of citizenship; and I believe that when a man is unable or unwilling to pay $1 to support the government that furnishes him protection, he is not qualified to properly exercise the elective franchise. But you do not throw that protection around the citizens who are entitled to the ballot if you merely put it up as a premium for some one to come in and purchase their votes by paying their reg- istration fee. You should place it in a way that when the registration is paid it is paid by the citizen because he appreciates the value and privileges of the American citizen, the privilege of voting as an American citizen, the privilege of being one of the governing body of his country. I say that if you limit this, if you merely put it before registration, the Hawaiian legislature may some day change the time of registration down to a week before the election, when those who have money will be able to pay the registration tax and thereby control their votes. Now, in this constitution (for it is practically a constitution we are about to adopt for Hawaii) I say we ought to protect the elective franchise to that extent and adopt the amendment offered by the gentleman from Mississippi, and at least put it nine months in advance of the election. The argument which my friend from Massachusetts makes, that the voter may be sick on that day or prevented by some reason from paying his registration nine months in advance, has no force, for the same rule may apply to four months or a week in advance. Not being obliged to pay it on any particular day, he has full opportunity. But I say, as the matter stands now, you have not properly guarded the bill against the corruption of the voter, and you should do it when you have the opportunity. Mr. GROSVENOR. Mr. Chairman, if I had my way about this matter, I would strike out all reference to this poll tax. There is no greater outrage upon the institutions of the American people than to say that a man unable, in the language of the gentleman from Alabama, to pay a dollar shall not be permitted to vote for the men who are to be his governors during the succeeding year. Though, on a small scale, it still, in essence and fact, is a direct money power operating against the voter if he happens to be a poor man. [Applause.] But, Mr. Chairman, in the wisdom of this committee, this bill has been so framed that the individual voter who desires to vote must pay his taxes, upon the first official notice to him or he can not vote. Let us see how well this machinery works in comparison with that. The voter comes to the proper place to register. He wants to vote - that is an indication of it. Then it is suggested to him, "Have you paid this dollar?" and then possibly - and very likely for the first time - it comes to his knowledge, or at least to his recollection, that he owes a dollar to the State or to the Government. Now, is it not enough if he pays that dollar then and there, in order to avail himself of his right to vote? Is this a machine to prevent voting? Is it a machine to send Congressmen here with 1,700 votes? Is that the purpose? Mr. UNDERWOOD. Does the gentleman desire to leave it open for somebody else to pay the taxes for the voter? Mr. GROSVENOR. I care nothing about that. If the. gentleman challenges me, I will say to him that I would rather have a thousand scattering bribed votes than a condition where there are no votes and the election is made by a caucus. Now, Mr. Chairman, what is the proposition here? How many of us remember to pay promptly on the day that they fall due all the little obligations that we owe to societies to which we belong or even to the State that taxes our property and taxes us in various ways? Has not a citizen done his whole duty if, when reminded of it, he pays and discharges the obligation he owes to his government? I say there ought to be no obstacles thrown in the way of the voter. There ought to be no deliberate purpose here to entangle and defeat the votes of this great body of men. I am willing to vote for the proposition as the committee has reported it, to require the payment of a capitation tax. I do not believe in it; it is a burden upon many people. But certainly if people discharge their duty in paying this tax at a time as far in advance of the election as when the registration is taken, that surely ought to be sufficient. We ought not to permit such an amendment as this to go into the bill. Mr. LINNEY. I would like to occupy a minute or two. Mr. KNOX. I trust the gentleman will remember that we are to vote at 4 o'clock. The CHAIRMAN. Debate is exhausted on this amendment. Mr. LINNEY. I move to strike out the last word. The CHAIRMAN. That would not be in order. Mr. LINNEY. I hope the gentleman from Massachusetts will allow me two minutes. Mr. KNOX. Very well; I yield the gentleman two minutes. Mr. LINNEY. Mr. Chairman, I am opposed to this amendment. I believe in manhood suffrage. I believe that crime should disqualify a citizen from the exercise of the right to vote, but misfortune or even negligence should not do so. If I read history aright, Sheridan, one of the grandest characters in all history, had his blanket sold, two days before his death, from off the cot on which he lay, for a tax. Yes, Sheridan, of whom it has been said: Nature made but one such man. And broke the die in molding Sheridan. The day before yesterday I had the honor of addressing an audience of 2,000 people in the State of North Carolina upon the proposition to put in pur constitution a provision somewhat like this. And I put to the sheriff the question, "How many white men in Moore County (one of the richest counties in the State) have not paid their poll tax up to this date?" He replied, "Seven hundred." Mr. KLUTTZ. I ask the gentleman whether that provision in