The
oligarchy was yearly becoming richer and more tyrannical, the people
poorer and more dependent, and it was necessary to erect stronger
and stronger barriers against such abuse of the franchise as
rendered it but an instrument the more in the hands of unprincipled
persons of consequence. As little can it be doubted that the ballot,
so far as it existed, had a beneficial operation in the Athenian
constitution. Even in the least unstable of the Grecian
commonwealths freedom might be for the time destroyed by a single
unfairly obtained popular vote; and though the Athenian voter was
not sufficiently dependent to be habitually coerced, he might have
been bribed, or intimidated by the lawless outrages of some knot of
individuals, such as were not uncommon even at Athens among the
youth of rank and fortune. The ballot was in these cases a valuable
instrument of order, and conduced to the Eunomia by which Athens was
distinguished among the ancient commonwealths.
But in the more advanced states of modern Europe, and especially
in this country, the power of coercing voters has declined and is
declining; and bad voting is now less to be apprehended from the
influences to which the voter is subject at the hands of others than
from the sinister interests and discreditable feelings which belong to
himself, either individually or as a member of a class.
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