The Louisiana Elections

Thti Senato Comuiittoo on Privileges and Elections reported Mouday in part on the Louisiuna case, in which they nay, " Tho election of the Greeley elootors ■was certified to by the Governor, bnt the official returns ot the election have not been counted" by the returning board oreated by tlie laws of Louisana for that paipose, and the persons who in tact made the examination and count had no legal authority to do so. ïhe election of the Grant electors is certified by the ïiynch returning board, ïiti'S tí board did not have thu official returns before ïhciu, and their nleotion is not certified by the Qovernor of the State, as roquired by act of Congress. The committeo are of the opinión that neither the Senato of the United States,nor both houses jointly, b. a vo the power under the Constitution to canvass the returns of an eleotion and count votes to determine who is Presidentiül electors, but the mode and manner of choosing electors are left exclnsive]y to the States. As to the other questions upon which the committeo were instructed to report, touchiug tbe existence of a legal' State goverument in Louisana and the admisskm of Ïhe Senators froin ttxat State, tbfcy are uot now preparad to report. The committee say the claim by the Lynch board of the right to count the affidavitB of persons ret'used registratipn under the law for the eniorceinent of the Fifteenth Amendiuent is unfoundci,. tbe law ocutaining no such provisión. In tho second section of the act, it is pro"vided, that, if any person lias been defeated in obtaining an office by reason of such denial to aay person or persons of the rigkt to vote, on account of race, color or previous aoadition of servitude, 6Jch person may bring soit iu the courts of tho United States to recover the office, but the section expressly provides that its benefits shall not extend to caudidates for State Legislatures, nor CongreBS, nor Electors of President and Vice-President. ïho report aleo says that Gov. Warmotb, ■under the acb of 1870, had the wholo machinery of eleetions in his own hands. Ho hatl the appointrnent of supervisors of registiabion, and in different parishes an appoin-tment of the oomrnissioners of election, and these officers, with but few exceptions, wera appointed from the ranks of those who wero opposed to the Eopublican party ; and we think froin the informal evidence before tho returning board, and what thia comniiUee bas learned in the course of tliis investigation, that tbere is little doubt that these advantages were used to the utmost, and every meuns resorted to in order to secure the triuinph of the party with which Ocv. Wuraioth was icting. Great difficultios were thrown ín the way of registratioa. Eepubliaans in many parishes wero put to great inconvenienco to find the register und in many instances were unablo to do 69. Tho places of registering and voting in many parishes were at pointe from the center of the population, often without notice ef tho j)lace being given. False regisiration papers, doublé voting, stufEing baHatboxes, and other fiauds and irregulurities were chaiged in the majority ei' the shes, and thero is nut ranch room to oubt tuat tho Lynch returuiu board I weve of the opinión, that apon, a air olour ion, the ïlepublicun, party would have arriad the State, und. that it has been i lioated. and hiudered iu every w.iy pusible by the power (hat coutrolled the ludchiuery of eloction ■; but, notwithstandïg all this, the Lynch returning board with the sort of ovidenco which was be'ore tbcm-had.no power undcr tue law of Ho State to investígate these charges of 'raud and injury, ot act upon their onviction of wrongs that had been sat'fered. Mr. Trumb-ull dissents frotn tho por;ion of the report in which tho opinión is xpressed that the Lynch board believed ;hat on a fair clection tho ltepublican jarty Would havo carried the State, and ;hat it had been cheated and hindered in every way by the party that controllod the powor and machinery of olection.