Electors Qualifications

ELECTORS' QUALIFICATIONS The development of the franchise in the last r oo years has steadily tended towards the abrogation of all electoral inequalities. The principal barrier to a vote was the property qualification, and this has in practically all countries been reduced to a minimum. Stability of citizenship is rather sought in residence qualifications such as the six months' residence or occupation as in Great Britain, six months' residence as in France, a "fixed place of abode" as in Denmark. In the United States residence qualifications range from three months to two years, and in Japan in 1925 male suffrage was enacted for all over 25, resident in their constituency for six months and "with their own means of subsistence." The age for the vote varies a good deal (see Table II.). So far no limitation has been put on the oldest age at which one may vote. The variation in age is differ ently explicable in each country. Russia, where the lowest age pertains, typifies the argument that those who are already indus trially productive can be trusted to vote, that the earlier the age at which one begins to vote, within reason, the sooner is one poli tically educated, and the political system needs the infusion of the spirit of youth. A high age, on the other hand, is counselled by rather conservative minds, who desire youthful rashness to be tempered by mature wisdom.

Women's suffrage (q.v.) has conquered most countries, but curiously enough not France, and other Latin countries like Spain, Italy, Portugal, Brazil and Argentine; nor do women vote in Belgium, Greece, Netherlands, Yugoslavia, South Africa or Japan. The attempts made during the i9th century to find an objective determinant of the right to vote in an educational test have been almost universally abandoned. They still exist in the educational tests of the States of the United States of America, but they come to very little, since only ability to read is required. But in the Southern States these tests are used to deprive the negroes of the vote. Brazil and Chile exclude illiterates from the vote, and this in the former country excludes more than one-half of all male adults. Hungary demands by the law of 1925 that male voters must have had at least three years in elementary schools, and women six. Plural voting is still permitted only in Great Britain, where special educational qualifications confer extra votes, and where university graduates, duly registered, have a vote in re spect of their university degree for the member of a university (Oxford, Cambridge, London and the northern universities) but such a vote cannot be used if it would make a third when added to the maximum of two votes acquired by residence or occupa tion of premises. Under the revision of the constitution in 1921, Belgium had a complicated system of plural voting, introduced in The countries we have so far included in our review of franchise qualifications only differ from each other a little in degree, but Russia differs from all others in having adopted the principle of productivity as the basis of the right to vote. In this system the vote is looked upon not as an individual right irrespective of any objective standard of worth, but as a gift of the community to be granted only to those who are productive. The Constitution of 1925 (Article 68a) says "All persons living by productive labour and of a general utility, and also persons employed in domestic economy making it possible for the former to do pro ductive work" shall enjoy the franchise. The definition of pro ductivity is obviously of the essence of this qualification, and that definition has varied since the inception of the Soviet Repub lic, and varies between locality and locality. In the first flush of the revolution the "bourgeois," that is, the "unproductive" classification, was drawn very widely, but recently, people who receive interest on State or municipal loans have been admitted to the franchise and peasants employing wage-labour are not ex cluded. Russia differs from other countries in not disqualifying for the vote on account of want of nationality. Productivity and political loyalty are the prime qualifications.

Aliens, convicts and lunatics are well-nigh universally dis qualified, and in some countries bankrupts also. In Great Britain peers are not allowed to vote, and until 1918 people in receipt of poor relief within a certain period before the election were disqualified.

The

time of the year when elections are held, the day of the week, how early the booths are opened and how late shut are important points. In agricultural countries elec tions (where there are fixed terms of parliament) are fixed after the spring sowing or in autumn after the harvest. The day of the week is especially important in an industrial country, where work must proceed with strictly disciplined regularity. Most European countries have adopted a Sunday or a holiday as elec tion day, but in Great Britain a characteristic muddle-headed ness has so far prevented its adoption. The dominions still re tain the English practice. In the United States there are laws allowing voters to be absent from work for the time necessary to give their vote. In Great Britain arrangements are made for the polling until Io P.M.; in Germany and France, where polling does not fall on an ordinary work-day, it ends at 6 P.M.

Other countries were earlier than Great Britain in adopting the system of one-day elections. A longer period has certain advan tages, but the single day has the decided advantage of reducing the economic effects of electioneering excitement. The one-day election is practically universal.