public opinion against the old issues and in favor of new issues.

Senator Hoar relates that he made careful preparation of a bill
for holding, under national authority, separate registrations and
elections for members of Congress. But when he consulted his
party associates in the Senate he found most of them averse to an
arrangement which would double the cost of elections and would
require citizens to register at different times for federal
elections and for state and municipal elections. Senator Hoar
thereupon abandoned that bill and prepared another which provided
that, upon application to court showing reasonable grounds, the
court should appoint officers from both parties to supervise the
election. The bill adopted a feature of electoral procedure which
in England has had a salutary effect. It was provided that in
case of a dispute concerning an election certificate, the circuit
court of the United States in which the district was situated
should hear the case and should award a certificate entitling the
one or other of the contestants to be placed on the clerk's roll
and to serve until the House should act on the case. Mr. Hoar
stated that the bill "deeply excited the whole country," and went
on to say that "some worthy Republican senators became alarmed.
They thought, with a good deal of reason, that it was better to
allow existing evils and conditions to be cured by time, and the
returning conscience and good sense of the people, rather than
have the strife, the result of which must be quite doubtful,
which the enactment and enforcement of this law, however moderate
and just, would inevitably create." The existence of this
attitude of mind made party advocacy of the bill a hopeless
undertaking and, though it was favorably reported on August 7,
1890, no further action was taken during that session. At the