The San Antonio Light

Under the head of "The man who did not vote," the New York Tribune says: "The closeness of the election has given voters in this and adjoining States a new consciousness of the power and influence of the individual ballot. The choice of a President and the control of the National Administration for four years have been determined by a few hundred votes. Any citizen who has brought his influence to bear even upon a narrow circle of acquaintances is therefore entitled to consider himself a factor of considerable importance in the solution of the year's political problem. It seldom happens that the election of a President has been so directly dependent upon the deliberate choice of the individual voter. This is a reflection which should have a sobering effect both upon impulsive and cautious citizens. If the ballot this year has given the individual voter an impressive sense of personal power, it has also carried with it a tremendous weight of personal responsibility. In view of these facts what can be said in favor of the man who didn't vote? He had five months in which to reach a decision and in the end stayed at home, either from inability or unwillingness to make an intelligent choice. He deliberately shirked the responsibility of citizenship, declining to make what he considered a choice of evils. The election has now passed and he has the melancholy satisfaction of counting himself a political cipher in an exciting contest of the highest importance in which every unit proved in the end to possess a determining value. We do not think the position of the man who didn't vote is at all enviable. He lacked either the courage, the intelligence or the conscience to make his influence felt either on one side or the other. Even if it were a choice of evils, as he claimed it to be, it was his duty as a citizen to make that choice and to give positive weight to his influence as a citizen. The individual voter only deserves respect and consideration when he weighs parties and men in the balance and gives the country the benefit of a deliberated choice."