had they been served, the parties could not have been convicted before any court of law.

Q. That is, for the illegal registration ?-A. That is, for the illegal registration.

Q. And that difficulty grows out of the loose way in which the regis tration is made?-A. It grows out of the loose way in which Mr. McCleary (the former city clerk) made the list, and the way in which Mr. Howard (of the board of registrars), who continues it, has testified that it was made and kept up.

Q. Do you think there is really any way of getting a correct list of the voters of this city and of the towns of this State whose lists are made up in like manner other than by beginning de novo, making new lists and requiring a new registration from the voter himself?-A. New York City does it every year and other cities and towns do it every year. I do not see why Massachusetts could not do it once in three years, or at least once in ten years.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. You think that, if done, the State ought to do it, do you not? You do not think that the Federal Government, through its agents, ought to come here to do it?-A. Somebody ought to do it.

Q. I ask you as to your opinion whether the Federal Government, with its machinery located at Washington, ought to come here to take part in the local government of your people or whether your people ought to govern themselves?-A. I think that the State ought to look after its voters upon a question relative to State officers, but the question as to what extent the general government should look after the voting for members of Congress and Presidential electors is one for men wiser and graver than I am to decide.

By Mr. BLAIR:

Q. You have no doubt, however, that where the State neglects to make such provision the nation should step in and see that such restrictions and safeguards as are necessary to insure a free and fair exercise of the suffrage in the choice of electors for President of the United States and of members of Congress are secured?-A. I think the ballot should be pure and free.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. Do you not think that the true way of getting a registry here is to be found only in the action of the legislature of your State and of your own people?—A. I think that the first step in that direction should be taken by the State, but whether the general government should not also look after voters at elections for President and members of Congress, is a question which, I think, has two sides to it. The vote of a single ward in the city of Boston may elect a member of Congress whose vote may determine the political complexion of the Massachusetts delegation in the House of Representatives, and, in the event of an election of President by the House, may decide the Presidential question. There fore whether Congress should not look after the voting in that ward at a Congressional election is a question which I leave to men wiser than myself to decide.

Q. Do you think that the Federal Government, through its officials great and small, should come here and spend its money to enforce restrictions of the constitution and laws of the State of Massachusetts as, for instance, that of an educational qualification for voting?-A. I do

not think I could answer the question in the way in which it is put, because a direct answer would not be an expression of my opinion.

Q. You can answer yes or no.-A. It is not a question that can be answered by yes or no.

Q. But surely you have an opinion as to whether the Federal Goverument ought to come here to enforce State restrictions?-A. Certainly not, if to enforce State restrictions simply, but I do not regard an election of a President of the United States or of a member of Congress as a State matter; it is a national matter.

(The question was repeated.)

A. The Federal Government has the right to require that a member of Congress shall receive only legitimate and proper votes, and such votes are to be given in accordance with the laws of the State of Massachusetts.

Q. You say there are upon the registry of the city of Boston from 3,500 to 5,000 illegal names, or names that ought not to be there. Was not this registry carefully scrutinized and scanned by the Republican and Democratic committees before the election of last year?-A. I could not say. Being entirely out of the political world, I do not know what action was taken by the committees. I presume that all the ward business was done in Boston as it is done elsewhere.

Q. Then, upon what data do you base the statement that there are from 3,500 to 5,000 names illegally upon this registry?-A. Upon what I discovered in the short space of time that I was occupied in going over the matter.

Q. How many names were complained of as being illegally upon the registry?—A. Four or five hundred, I should think.

Q. How many persons were convicted for being illegally upon the reg istry?-A. None. As I told you, we abandoned all prosecutions. My opinion in regard to the number was formed from the testimony of the city clerk, who testified that he had been in the habit of copying names upon his own books from the assessors' books without knowing whether they were the names of voters or not. It was from that testimony that I formed that opinion. I think that I asked the city clerk as to the number of those names, and that he conceded there were 2,000 or more, but of that I am not positive. My impression is that I asked him about how many he thought there were.

Q. I am trying to get at the fact whether the State carefully scrutinizes her list or not.-A. I do not think that she does. I think decidedly not, so far as the city of Boston is concerned.

Q. Is there no scrutiny by the officials who make up the lists?— A. The list is the same that has come down to us from previous years.

Q. But not scrutinized from year to year?-A. No, sir; it is the same list; it is the list which has been published and which will be republished from year to year. The dead will be stricken off and those who have changed their residences will be assigned other residences. Q. Who does that?-A. I cannot tell you.

Q. Do you not know who it is that purifies that list ?-A. I do not. Q. Is not provision made for an appeal to the courts of Massachusetts to take off names?—A. I think that the board of registrars do strike off

names.

Q. You attack their action then simply upon the statement of the city clerk?-A. I do not attack their action at all. This board of registrars was appointed in 1874. and they took the list as they found it.

Q. What is the remedy? Is it that the Federal Government is to correct this list or that the State is to correct it?-A. I think that the

State ought to begin at it, and I urged, so far as it was in my power to urge, at the last session, that the legislature should take action in that matter. The subject was discussed for a long time and a bill prepared, but the bill did not go through.

By Mr. McDONALD:

Q. In the front part of the book which you have produced, I find a memorandum setting forth the number of appointments of deputy mar shals at 225 for Boston and 13 for Lowell.-A. That is a memorandum of the whole number sworn in before me, but possibly some of those did not serve and were not paid.

Q. How many special supervisors were appointed for the city of Bos ton in 1878?—A. Two hundred and twelve.

Q. Were any appointed elsewhere; and, if so, how many?-A. They were also appointed for the cities of Lowell and Cambridge; in Lowell 10. in Cambridge 10.

Q. How many were appointed in 1876?—A. In 1876 fifty two supervisors were appointed for the city of Boston, being two for each of the twenty-six voting precincts. The number of voting precincts was increased in 1878 to 106, each ward being divided into four or five precincts, making the number of special supervisors 212.

Q. State the number of deputy marshals appointed in 1876.-A. For the city of Boston in 1876 one hundred and seventeen deputy marshals were appointed. My records do not show their party affiliations. In the same year two supervisors were appointed for the town of Revere and 16 supervisors for the city of Worcester. No deputy marshals were appointed in either of the two last-mentioned places.

Q. Is Revere a town of over 20,000 inhabitants, or were the supervi sors appointed there under the other provision of the law, which authorizes appointments to be made upon the application of ten citizens ?—A. These appointments were made upon the application of ten citizens. The inhabitants of the town did not number 20,000.

By the CHAIRMAN:

Q. What reports were made by your supervisors in Worcester as to the condition of the voting lists?-A. Up to 1878 no request was made to the circuit court to appoint supervisors for any purpose other that the supervision of the voting. The registration was never scrutinized until 1878. In 1878 Lowell, Cambridge, and Boston were supervised; in 1876, Worcester.

Q. Was any return made by the supervisors, either in Lowell or Cambridge, of persons not entitled to vote whose names were upon the list? -A. The registration of Cambridge was not supervised; only the vot

The registration of Lowell was supervised, and the twelve supervisors there appointed reported to me no case of false registration. Q. Were any arrests made for illegal voting or illegal registration in Lowell?-A. No, sir; nor were any made in Cambridge for illegal voting.

Q. About what is the population of Lowell?-A. I do not know. The number of voters is some nine thousand, I think.

By Mr. McDONALD:

Q. At the election of 1878 these appointments, in Boston, were made with reference to the election of members of Congress ?-A. Yes, sir. Q. What other officers were voted for or offices filled at the same election before the same election officers ?-A. Governor, lieutenant-governor, members of the legislature, a dozen or more of State officers.

Q. Then it was a full State election, at which the chief officers of the State, members of the legislature, and other minor officers, as well as members of Congress, were elected?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. The warrants you had issued against these persons who, as you thought, had been unlawfully registered, were for their arrest if they offered to vote at that election?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. Then, as I understand you, these warrants would have been executed against such persons if they had voted for State officers alone, the same as if they had voted for members of Congress ?—A. Yes, sir; I think the language of the statute is in substance that the ballot of a voter at an election at which a member of Congress is voted for is to be presumed to have upon it the name of a candidate for Congress.

Q. So that their voting for State officers alone would have made these men liable to arrest?-A. Yes, sir.

Q. As the State officers and Congressmen were voted for on the same tickets, on the same day, and before the same election officers, there could have been no distinction between them so far as concerned the action of the election officers, and therefore the execution of the Federal law with reference to members of Congress necessarily interfered with and affected the State election as well?-A. The law requires the election officers to scrutinize every ballot that is cast.

Q. The election officer is required to take special cognizance of ballots cast for members of Congress; but as all the ballots contained also the names of the candidates for State and local offices, there was necessarily involved a scrutiny of the State election as well as of the Congressional election?-A. Yes, sir; and my instructions to the supervisors were to count and report the vote for the two candidates for governor, so that by comparing with that the vote for member of Congress I might have an evidence of the correctness of their count.

Q. You had to have before you the result of the State as well as of the Congressional election in order to furnish you with the necessary information as to whether the law had been executed?—A. Yes, sir.

Q. In fact, then, the Federal supervision extends as well over State elections as over Congressional elections in this State?-A. You must draw your own inference from it.

Q. Is not that the fact?-A. No, sir; I do not think so.

Q. Where is the distinction?-A. The supervision is over the election of a member of Congress, but it necessarily acts upon the State election and insists upon purifying that as well as the Congressional election. I am only speaking of it as a matter of purification. I do not look at it from a political point of view.

Q. And I am looking at it with reference to how far the Federal law lays its hand upon the State authorities in the ballots cast by the electors for State officers.-A. I can only answer the question by saying there never has been the least conflict between the United States and State officers in the city of Boston; that everything has been harmonious. And I should judge from that there need be no complaint of interference at all.

Q. It may or may not be a very good thing at present for the Federal Government to take entire control of the elections in this State, but I am inclined to think that Massachusetts would make some objection to that. Now you undertook to purify the registry which the State had provided. I will ask you whether every man of the eleven hundred whose names you noted for challenge was not to be challenged if he offered to vote for State officers the same as if he offered to vote for members of Congress?-A. The law makes no distinction.

Q. That is true. So that therefore he was to be challenged at that election if he offered to vote, whether he offered to vote specifically for members of Congress or not?-A. Yes.

Q. At any election in this State at which members of Congress are not elected, your machinery is not at work and you have then nothing to do with the election ?-A. We have then nothing to do with the election.

Q. Consequently all these persons who you have spotted for challenge in the investigations you have made would vote at the State elections when members of Congress are not voted for, or, if challenged, would be challenged by electors of the State or by State authority. So that if there was a special election in this State for governor, for instance (if the law made provision for that in case of a vacancy), all these men who you have undertaken to winnow out from among the qualified voters would then be voting under the laws of the State without any aid on the part of the Federal Government to assist the State in making her elections. I ask you now whether under the plea of secur ing a fair administration of State laws in regard to the qualifications of voters in elections of members of Congress (for it is only to such elections that this Federal machinery is supposed to be applied, though we find that in its operations and effects it covers a great deal more ground according to your statement about it), I ask you whether under such a plea you think it is right for the Federal Government to interfere in the elections of State officers and to influence the election of a governor, a lieutenant governor, or members of a legislature?-A. That is a grave question, that I must leave to wiser heads than mine to settle. I can only say that so far as the supervisors' law is concerned it has worked very well in Massachusetts, and no complaints about it have been made that I have heard.

Q. I am not impeaching your official action, but am merely asking for your opinion. You would not for a moment claim that the Federal Government could pass a law such as that and make it directly applicable to State officers, would you ?—A. Of course not.

Q. Does it not, then, come down to about this, the remedy of the old Virginia justice: When applied to for a search warrant for a turkey, the justice replied that he could not find any precedent for a search warrant of that kind, but that he would give the party a search warrant for a cow and while he was looking for the cow he might find the turkey. Is not this case about on a level with that one?-A. You must also pass upon that question.

Q. I notice that in your second instructions to the supervisors, those which you issued for their guidance on election day, you state that the law authorizes the arrest, without warrant, of any person voting or attempting to vote illegally in the presence of the supervisors. Do the reports made to you by the special supervisors give you information as to the number of persons so arrested, if any, at the last election?— A. All persons arrested are at once brought before me. None were arrested without a warrant.

Q. But the law authorized an arrest without warrant where the act was committed in the presence of the supervisor?-A. No arrest was made without warrant in this district at the election.

Q. It is the duty of the supervisors to make report to you of what transpired in their view, and what they did on the election day; those reports you have there before you, and you say they did not report any summary arrests of that class?-A. Yes, sir.