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Election expected to draw 18 million voters

WASHINGTON, Nov. 6, 1916 (UP) - To-morrow about 18,000,000 citizens of the United States will select the 29th president and vice-president of the republic.

Although there are five national tickets in the field, and one lone vice-presidential aspirant, it is certain that only two of these tickets will figure largely in the vote counting. The 29th president, therefore, will be either Woodrow Wilson or Charles Evans Hughes - the first a Democrat, the second, a Republican.

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The unsuccessful ones will be: Socialist: for president, Allan L. Benson, of New York, and for vice president George R. Kirkpatrick, of New Jersey. Prohibitionist: J. Frank Hanly of Indiana, and Ira Lambrith, of Tennessee. Social Labor: Arthur E. Reimer, of Massachusetts, and Caleb Harrison, of Illinois. Progressive: John M. Parker, of Louisiana, vice-presidential candidate.

While the presidential and vice presidential candidates are struggling for supremacy, 68 men are seeking election to the United States Senate in a vote-getting race of scarcely less importance. There are 35 vacancies to be filled in the upper House of the national legislature. Regardless of which side is successful in the presidential race, they must elect senators to hold majority in the upper house, if they expect to put through their legislation. The Democrats are now in the majority. The G.O.P. has set out to elect ten Republican senators out of the 35 to be chosen, and Republican chieftains to-morrow will scan with considerable anxiety the popular vote for senator in the 33 states where the people are expressing their will on these candidates.

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Next to the senatorial race in importance comes the voting for congressional nominees. There are 436 members of the lower House to be elected, not counting territorial delegates. The present House of Representatives shows a working majority for the Democrats of 23 votes - counting 197 Republicans, 6 Progressives, one independent and one Socialist as the minority, against 229 Democrats. Republicans hope to sweep this majority into the discard. Briefly summarized, the two great parties will stand to-morrow for these great issues - and in this list are given only the outstanding issues:

Democrats: "Wilson kept us out of war." A vote for Republicans is a vote for war. Wilson stands for peace with honor and prosperity. The tariff for revenue policy as proved its entire workableness.

Republicans: Weakness of the administration's Mexican policy. Warning of the chaos which will come after the European war, if the Democratic tariff is maintained and Europe dumps her goods here in the race for commercial supremacy. "False prosperity" due to the European war. The "surrender to force" indicated in passage of the Adamson eight-hour railroad bill. Broken promises by Democracy as to protection of American citizens abroad; reduction of the cost of living; and as to economy and efficiency.

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Of most importance, in the minds of the leaders of the two great parties, is the swing which the Progressive vote of four years ago will take to-morrow. Of the trifle under 16,000,000 of popular votes cast in 1912, nearly 5,000,000 were for Roosevelt and Johnson, running on the "third ticket" under the Progressive emblem. That five million votes, delivered in one block, would be sufficient, it is conceded, to elect either Wilson or Hughes.

But leaders on both sides to-day pointed out that the defections of 1912 were from both parties and in the four years which have passed away many of that five million have realigned themselves. The Progressive split in June of this year, when Roosevelt sought to swing endorsement of the party he led in 1912 to Hughes, has brought claims from both Republicans and Democrats that the major part of the five million votes will be with them to-morrow. Many prominent Progressive leaders have endorsed Wilson; possibly a slightly larger number have endorsed Hughes. How the rank and file will vote is likely to determine the election.

The five million of Progressives is one "block" vote which has been sought after assiduously by both parties.

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There are two other blocks for which there has been considerable angling - the labor and the hyphenate vote. Democracy expects the labor vote to be solidly lined up for Wilson and Democratic policies - mainly because of President Wilson's solution, through the Adamson law, of the threatening railroad strike. President Gompers of the American Federation of Labor is actively supporting the present administration. Democratic leaders also think their present slogan of prosperity will influence workingmen to vote for Wilson and Marshall. On the other hand, Republican leaders are confident Candidate Hughes' assault on the Adamson bill as a "surrender to force" and an abandonment of the collective principle of bargaining for which labor has so long fought, will make labor votes for the Republican principles.

G.O.P managers also think a powerful impression has been made in the "false prosperity" revelation which Republican orators have so vigorously pounded home. As to the "hyphen" vote Democratic leaders have sought to make campaign material out of the outspoken support by several "hyphenate" leaders of the Republican candidates. Republican managers have steadfastly maintained complete ignorance of the attitude of the hyphenate - and have flatly denied any agreement of any kind whatsoever with any faction or group of naturalized Americans.

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One feature of interest in the voting to-morrow will be the part which will be played by women voters. In at least one state the women have an opportunity to decide the electoral vote of that state. In Illinois there are approximately 800,000 women registered and ready to vote for the first time on a presidential and vice-presidential candidate. In Montana a woman is running on the Republican ticket for Congress. In Washington and Oregon votes of feminine balloters may have a direct bearing on the way the states throw their electoral figures.

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