TABLE V LARGEST AND SMALLEST LEGISLATIVE DISTRICTS IN SELECTED STATES, 1920 1 Divided into five districts. "No recent vote available. Population of each district not given. Their The population of the nineteen Cook County districts is not given separately. average population is 160,684. A conservative estimate would place the population of the largest of these (the 25th) at something over 300,000. Each district elects three representatives. In 1924 the 25th district cast a total vote for members of the state legislature (lower house) of 134,367. Divided into six districts. Population of each district not given. The following comparisons show how far the single-member district system falls short of giving equality of voting power: The 154,915 Democratic voters in Georgia elected 12 members. More Votes but Fewer Members The 120,793 Democratic voters in Alabama elected 10 members. The 47,495 Republican voters in Vermont elected 2 members. The 179,614 Republican voters in North Carolina elected no members. It is such results as these, so obviously in violation of the principles on which our government was founded, that first suggested several generations ago the need of a change from the singlemember district or any other majority or plurality system of electing representatives. And an analysis of such results revealed the remedy-the election of representatives from multi-member districts, each by enough agreeing voters to deserve a spokesman. This is the remedy, of course, which has come to be called proportional representation. . . . 41. The Cleveland Provision for Proportional Representation Cleveland adopted its present charter, providing for the city manager form of government, in November, 1921. The old system of electing the council from thirty-three wards was swept away, and in its place the new charter provides a body of twenty-five, to be chosen from four districts. The number of councilmen from a district varies from five to seven according to population. With a population of nearly a million, Cleveland is the largest city in the United States to adopt the Hare system of representation, and it was immediately recognized that the experiment would be watched closely and critically by other large municipalities. For this reason, the proponents of the Hare system took special care to work out as carefully as possible the rules for its operation. The following extracts from the Cleveland charter contain these provisions, and show how the members of the council are nominated and elected.1 SOURCE-Charter of the City of Cleveland (Cleveland, 1923), 40-45. NOMINATIONS BY PETITION Section 158. Any person eligible to the Council may be placed in nomination therefor by a petition filed in his behalf with the election authorities and signed by at least five hundred electors of the district for which he seeks to be a candidate. Signatures to nominating petitions need not all be appended to one paper but to each separate paper there shall be attached an affidavit of the circulator thereof stating that each signature thereto was made in his presence and is the genuine signature of the person whose name it purports to be. Each signer of a petition shall sign his name in ink or indelible pencil and, after his name, shall designate his residence by street and number, or other description sufficient to identify the place, and give the date when his signature was made. If any elector sign petitions for more than one candidate his signature shall be invalid except as to the petition first signed. 1An unsuccessful attempt was made (August 11, 1925) to repeal these provisions by using the initiative. NOMINATING PETITION PAPERS. Section 159. The form of nominating petition papers shall be substantially as follows: We, the undersigned, hereby present whose residence is........... .... Cleveland, Ohio, as a candidate for the Council, to be voted for at the election to be held on the.... .day of November, 19......; and we individually certify that we are qualified to vote for candidate for the Council, and that we have not signed a petition nominating any other person for the Council to be voted for at such election. deposes and says that he is the circulator of this petition paper and that the signatures appended thereto were made in his presence and are the genuine signatures of the persons whose names they purport to be. Signed... FILING AND VERIFICATION OF PETITIONS. Section 160. All separate papers comprising a nominating petition shall be assembled and filed with the election authorities as one instrument at least forty days prior to the first Tuesday following the next succeeding first Monday in November. Within ten days after the filing of a nominating petition the election |