preme, and includes the right to employ the necessary means to carry
it into effect.

The statutes of the United States which regulate the election of
members of the House of Representatives, an essential part of which
it is proposed to repeal by this bill, have been in force about eight
years. Four Congressional elections have been held under them, two of
which were at the Presidential elections of 1872 and 1876. Numerous
prosecutions, trials, and convictions have been had in the courts of
the United States in all parts of the Union for violations of these
laws. In no reported case has their constitutionality been called in
question by any judge of the courts of the United States. The validity
of these laws is sustained by the uniform course of judicial action
and opinion.

If it is urged that the United States election laws are not necessary,
an ample reply is furnished by the history of their origin and of
their results. They were especially prompted by the investigation and
exposure of the frauds committed in the city and State of New York
at the elections of 1868. Committees representing both of the leading
political parties of the country have submitted reports to the House
of Representatives on the extent of those frauds. A committee of the
Fortieth Congress, after a full investigation, reached the conclusion
that the number of fraudulent votes cast in the city of New York alone
in 1868 was not less than 25,000. A committee of the Forty-fourth
Congress in their report, submitted in 1877, adopted the opinion that
for every 100 actual voters of the city of New York in 1868 108 votes
were cast, when in fact the number of lawful votes cast could not
have exceeded 88 per cent of the actual voters of the city. By this
statement the number of fraudulent votes at that election in the city
of New York alone was between thirty and forty thousand. These frauds
completely reversed the result of the election in the State of New
York, both as to the choice of governor and State officers and as to
the choice of electors of President and Vice-President of the United
States. They attracted the attention of the whole country. It was
plain that if they could be continued and repeated with impunity free
government was impossible. A distinguished Senator, in opposing the
passage of the election laws, declared that he had "for a long time
believed that our form of government was a comparative failure in the
larger cities." To meet t