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1876.] OF THE HOUSE OF DELEGATES. 1299
selves complained of the absence of most of them—feeling
convinced they would fully justify them by their testimony.
In reference to the charge of fraud, your Committee report
that no fraud whatever was shewn to have been perpetrated
at the Municipal election, whilst at the State election, the
evidence was, that at the Fourth Precinct of the Twelfth
Ward, one hundred and seventy-seven more ballots were
found in the ballot-box, than had been recorded by the
clerks; that at the Third Precinct of the Twelfth Ward,
thirty more ballots were found in the ballot-box, than had
been recorded by the clerks; an J that in the Third Precinct
of the Fifteenth Ward, two hundred and sixty more ballots
were found in the ballot-box than had been recorded by the
clerks. Of course, your Committee could not discover whether
this excess of ballots over the number recorded on the clerks
lists, was exclusively of the one or of the other political party,
or whether it was partly of the one and partly of the other
party, or whether it was due to the negligence or ineffi-
ciency of the said clerks, or to the per etration of fraud; and
if to the latter, whether the adherents of the one or of the
other political party, had been guilty of it. If due to fraud,
a v;cious election in said precincts would not invalidate tht
election in the other precincts of those wards, or in the pre-
cincts of the other wards of the city, any more than it would
vitiate the election in the districts of the State.
As to the charges of intimidation and violence, your Com-
mittee report, that the evidence disclosed the fact that, at tht
municipal election, the colored voting population in those
precincts of the city where that element was populous, had
early possession of the polls, going to them in large num-
bers so early as five o'clock in the morning, and remaining
at them throughout the entire day, thus obstructing and pre-
venting free access to the polls, to the great hindrance of a
large majority of the white voting population of those pre-
cincts, many of whom left the polls without having deposited
their ballots. There were, however, no breaches of the peace of
any moment at said election. The evidence further disclosed
the fact, that a certain political organization, attached to the
Republican Party in the city, had appealed, through its reg-
ularly constituted officers, to the said element to go agaia to
the polls in numers, and early on the morning of the State
election. They went. But found that the tactics which they
had employed at the municipal election, were now being used
by their political opponents. As a result, collisions of an
unusual character occurred in the neighborhood of the polls
of the First Precinct of the Eighteenth Ward, of the Third
Precinct of the Fifteenth Ward, and of the First Precinct of
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