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Show THE BALLOT A SACRED INHERITANCE. Election day ought to be held as a most sacred day in the United States. It is a day when the Nation gathers as before an altar to pay its tribute trib-ute to the freedom which is ours, and to record through the ballot its will. No other nation has any such day. There are elections in. other countries, coun-tries, but they are meaningless as compared with ours. In Great Britain they mean, little more than to record the will of the people regarding a certain man the choice, say, between a Gladstone Glad-stone and a Beaconsfleld. In France, as a rule, it is still more of a personal matter, and while the populace sing their great anthem and shout "Long live the Republic," they have but a republic in name; they know nothing of the personal, political politi-cal and religious freedom of this side of the Atlantic. At-lantic. When the ballot was given to the American Ameri-can people by the fathers, the deed of gift, in a few words, read in effect as follows: "Men of the United States take notice! The wrongs, the tyrannies, tyran-nies, the superstitions of the Old World are all put aside. The shadow of no throne darkens the I pure air which you breathe. No standing army menaces you. There is no earth-created nobility to eat out your substances and to move among you a constant sign of your inferiority. The theory of the new government which has been but just created cre-ated is that a nation of free men, men unvexed by any unnecessary law, men absolutely free in person, per-son, in religious and political beliefs, will prize the gift that is theirs, will be jealous of their country's honor and quick to resent any reproach cast upon it. For protection a free ballot is given you under the belief that in a land of such freedom, free-dom, a, land that kindles hopes so bright, a land where the humblest may aspire to achieve the loftiest honors, there will be such a love for such a land in the hearts of the people, such a pride in seeing the fair land's advancement, that the love and patriotism thus awakened will bo guides to the people that will steady their combined judgment judg-ment and give to the decrees which their ballots will record a sanctity which will be all-compelling and out of which no mistakes can come." It was on such a theory that the ballot was Slven to the American people. The belief was that it would be looked upon as a sacred Aegis behind which the people might rest content. It as further believed that a gift so sacred would guarded and kept pure. In ancient Rome there was a temple built in honor of the goddess who was belioved to be the Suardian of the hearthfire, the family life and vir gin purity. In this temple was a hearth on which a fire in honor of the goddess was kept burning perpetually, and only virgins were permitted to feed its flame. So sacred was this office held that the noblest Roman maidens sought the privilege of being vestal virgins, and when one of these proved to be untrue to her holy task, her punishment punish-ment was death. That history supplies a symbol of the thought which warmed the hearts of the fathers when they gave to the people of this country the ballot. It was to be the guardian of all the homes of the land; it was to be held as sacred on every hearthstone, hearth-stone, and though no direct penalty was prescribed pre-scribed for the abuse of this gift, such abuse would by those fathers have been looked upon as a crime quite as monstrous as the ancient Romans held the unfaithfulness of a vestal virgin to be. On Tuesday next this sacred day of the year will come to Utah. On that day in every citizen's hand the ballot will be placed. Are there any unclean un-clean hands that will be stretched out to grasp it? Are there any men or women in Utah who will cast that ballot at the dictation of any other man or woman? If so, they will debase themselves and dishonor the flag above them. Are there any who will cast it, not as their best judgment dictates, not as their patriotism prompts them to cast it? If so, they will dishonor the men who marched through the fiery waves of a great war to establish estab-lish on a shore of peace this liberty which is our inheritance. The dishonor of such an act not only reaches back to the fathers, but it reaches forward for-ward to brand with shame the brows of children yet to be born to those traitors to native land. Remember, voters, the ballot was all the safeguard left you with which to preserve your liberties. Remember Re-member that if true to yourselves and your country, coun-try, it is a safeguard all-sufficient. |