OSHKOSH COURIER

December 12, 1855

 

Waupaca County

 

It may have been remarked by our readers that as long as it appeared that a fraudulent canvass of the votes of two towns only, had given a majority of 127 for Bashford in Waupaca county, there was not a word upon the subject uttered by the Shanghai papers.  They were as whist as mice about the “tall voting” of that county, and the propriety of “throwing it out”.  But having discovered that a fair canvass of the entire county gives Barstow a majority of 300, they all at once change their tune and intimate that the whole county should be thrown out by the State Canvassers as fraudulent.  This course, while it would lose Barstow over 400 majority, would only lose Mr. Bashford his fraudulent claim of 128 votes cast the best that can be made of it, in two towns only, and that before daylight.  It is singular, what a difference it makes with them, “whose ox is gored!”  We have, however inadvertently it was said, the authority of the Journal to justify the State canvassers in throwing out the votes of the two towns, which are claimed as the vote of the whole county giving Bashford 127 majority.  It says:

“It is equally clear that the State canvassers cannot go back of the returns of the county canvassers, or receive the votes of the towns returned directly to them, instead of the county boards, as we have heard it intimated they would do.”

As we understand the Waupaca case, it is covered by this language exactly.  Bashford’s friends procured that two towns giving him a majority should be returned directly to the State canvassers, instead of to the county board.

The following extract of a letter from a gentleman in Waupaca county, probably states the case pretty correctly:

“I see there is some difficulty about the canvass of this county.  It appears that several towns returned officially gives Barstow 345 majority, and two other towns, said to have been canvassed at Mukwa, give Bashford 127 majority.  There is still another town which was not returned to either place in time for the county canvass, which gave Barstow 57 majority, out of 65 votes.  I think that counting all that is claimed on both sides, Barstow’s true majority in the county is 276.

            “There was heavy voting done on both sides.  In the two towns returned to Mukwa there are 1316 inhabitants, and they cast 665 votes – or about one-half of the inhabitants voted.  In the nine towns returned to Waupaca there are 3121 inhabitants, of whom about 1000 voted, or nearly one-third. You see the Bashford men polled a greater vote in proportion to the population than we did, but this is accounted for from the fact that they opened the polls before daylight in the morning, thus giving them more time to do it in.”

            This is all the information which we possess on the subject.  We have no fears but that notwithstanding the suspicions prorogated by the pious Journal and its coadjutors, the State canvassers will decide the question  by honest and fair adjudication, according to the best lights which they have, and to the satisfaction of everybody but the dunces, soreheads, and “scurvy politicians” whose “glass eyes” can see no honesty in any act of “Barstow and the balance”.                   – Argus Democrat