72 JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS [Jan. 19,

persons had access to this vault, and others might have had,
while the tickets were in this condition, and that although
visitors were usually accompanied by a clerk, the latter was
in no case a sworn officer, and the entire election returns were
thus in a legal sense not in the custody of any one. The un-
dersigned are therefore of opinion that the re-count which
gives the contestant a majority of thirty-five, is wholly unre-
liable, and can have no weight in invalidating the right of
the sitting member to his seat.

The only remaining point which the undersigned deem it
essential to discuss, is, the rejection of numerous ballots of re-
gistered, and it is therefore alleged, qualified voters, which
would have been cast for contestant. They amount to thirty-
one. They were offered by men who were not registered in
1865, being entered in the registry of voters as disqualified
by reason of disloyalty, with the names of two or more wit-
nesses against them, in most of the cases. But they were re-
gistered in 1866, and claiming that fact to be conclusive and
binding on the Judges of Election, they refused to take any
oath touching their qualifications under the Constitution as
legal voters, and were accordingly rejected.

In the opinion of the undersigned, the fact of a citizen's
being registered is but prima facie evidence of his right to
vote, not conclusive and binding upon the Judges of Election
and that the ballots of the thirty-one citizens aforesaid were
legally and properly refused.

The language of section 4, Article 1 of the Constitution is
explicit: "the Judges of Election at the first election held un-
der this Constitution shall, and at any subsequent election
may administer to any person offering to vote the following
oath," &c.

It was the design of the framers of the Constitution to pre-
serve the purity of the ballot box not only from the votes of
rebels, their aiders and abettors, but also from those of aliens,
minors &c., hence they gave the Judges of Election not
merely a temporary and transient, but a continuing power
to be exercised from year to year.

The ingenious sophistry of professional quibblers has, for
partisan purposes, endeavored to give to the Registry Law an
interpretation wholly at variance with its spirit and intent.
But if there be any ambiguity in that law, there is none in
section 21 of Article 35 of the Code of Public General Laws,
entitled, Elections; which never having been repealed, stands
to day in its original force, and leaves the Judges of Election
with powers unimpaired. And it is under the provisions of
this law, that the proceedings in this contest are had.

The only official opinion directly in point, is that of the
Attorney General of this State, which relieves the undersign-