parently were cast upon the
amendment. All good election laws provide that a definite number of
ballots shall be officially issued to each precinct; that the number
of those deposited in the ballot box, the number spoiled and those
unused shall not only tally with the number received, but the
unused ones must be counted, sealed, labelled and returned with the
certificate recording the count. This is the law of Iowa; but the
report of the investigation, as given to the press, shows that in
thirty-five counties out of the forty-four investigated no tally list
was used and there was nothing by which to check in order to determine
the correctness of the number on the certificate. In many cases no
unused ballots were returned. The poll lists did not tally with the
number of votes and even a recount could not reveal whether fraud or
carelessness had led to irregularity.

Despite the fact that the Iowa law provides that a definite number of
ballots and the same number of each kind is to be distributed to each
precinct, the separate suffrage ballots in a number of cases were
reported by election officials as not having arrived until the voting
had been in progress for some time; and in others they gave out an
hour before the polls closed.

Forty-seven varieties of violations of the election law are alleged to
have been committed. Do these indicate wilful fraud or mere ignorance
and carelessness? Just now no one seems prepared to answer. Meantime
Iowa, one of the most intelligent and progressive states in the
nation, stands at the bar of public opinion accused of incapacity
to conduct an honest election. How she will defend herself, what
reparation she will make to her women, and what steps she will take to
insure clean elections and better enforcement of her election law in
the future are problems which await the Legislature. That body cannot
refuse to take action of some kind without inviting the suspicion that
her legislators prefer conditions which lend themselves to the
base uses of election manipulators whenever they may care to avail
themselves of them.

On November 7, 1916, woman suffrage and prohibition amendments were
voted upon in South Dakota. It was the first time these two questions
have gone to referendum in the same election and the results furnish
interesting data for comparison.

Certain facts tell a story which should make progressive, patriotic
Americans and fair-minded Congressmen reflect.

Prohibitio