INFORMAL VOTING.

Clutha Leader, Volume XX, Issue 1032, 4 May 1894, Page 3

INFORMAL VOTING.

Ifc seems to me rather extraordinary that f>ny question should have arisen as to whether or not an informal vote should be counted as a vote. How can a mere attempt to vote and a failure to observe the requisite formalities be held to be a vote '? A document purporting to be a will, though properly drawn and signed by the testator is no will at all if any formality required by law, such as the attestation by witnesses, is not observed, and it has no legal effect whatever. If a mere attempt to vote, and a failure to do so properly, was to be held to be a vote as regards the requisite three-fifths majority ifc should have been stated in the Act, but the framers of the Act do not seem to have contemplated the contingency of a large number of informal votes. It is somewhat singular that there should have been so many informal votes afc the late licensing election, ancl yefc it is not so very surprising under the circumstances. There was so much to do in the way of crossing out and not crossing out in the voting papers that fche subject required some close attention even from people used, to literary work, but inasmuch as many voters, including many quite young people, — although they might read well enough — were quite unused to the perusal of formal legal documents, it is no great wonder there should have been some confusion in their minds, and that mistakes should have been made. It would be well in future if some expedient could be resorted 10 to make the subject more plainly comprehensible.