ABOLITION OF THE PARTY CIRCLE AND PARTY COLUMN
In a rough way it has long been perceived that the party circle and
party column on ballots are a vital part of the machinery necessary
to direct the politically ignorant voter how to vote. If the voter is
not only politically ignorant but also illiterate, the party circle
is about all he can use, and only by directing his attention to that
can he be told what to do. If the politically ignorant voter is an
intelligent man he needs the party column at least so that he may
take its suggestion when he attempts to vote for candidates about
whom he knows nothing. It is not strange, therefore, that, in the
war on politocracy, the abolition of both the party circle and the
party column have been proposed. The more remarkable fact is that
such a proposal has received so little support. The fact is that with
our long ballots the abolition of the party circle and the party
column would result either in a clumsy restoration of the party column
by the furnishing of party lists to the individual voter, or else
in a disfranchisement of the voter so startling and complete, and a
governmental chaos so much more inimical to good government than the
extra-legal politocracy, that popular support for such a movement has
been generally withheld.
[Illustration: SPECIMEN BALLOT. 10th Congressional, 7th Senatorial
District.]
Imagine, for instance, the party circle and party column abolished
for the state and local offices on the long ballot in Cook County
reproduced, _ante_, opposite p. 29. We should then have a ballot with a
single column to fill 34 offices, with 181 candidates, the Republican,
Democratic, Prohibitionist, Socialist, Social Labor, and Progressive,
all lumped together. The large majority of voters could not rely upon
their own knowledge of the candidates to make an intelligent choice.
The burden upon the voter is too great. If the electorate voted at
random there would arise a political chaos in officeholding. The voter
would be least likely to do this. If the voter felt he could not vote
at all he would be plainly and utterly disfranchised. The voter would
undoubtedly enter the voting booth with a party list in his hand as the
most rational method of securing advice as to whom to vote for. That
would be in effect a restoration of the party column which had been
abolished. No wonder then that popular sentiment cannot be aroused over
the general abolition of the party circle and the party column where
the excessively long ballot is placed before large numbers of voters at
frequent intervals.