COLISEUM, CHICAGO, June 12, 1920 (UP) -- The Republican party in the South has got to poll more votes or be penalized through reduction of its representation in future national conventions, as a result of action taken by the convention today.
A resolution presented by Paul Rowland, Ohio, directs the national convention to make up a new basis of state representation within a year from today. It was adopted unanimously, although Southern delegates made a futile effort to have it ruled out of order.
The resolution is aimed at a condition in Southern states which was brought sharply to the attention of credentials committeemen and the resolutions committee of the present convention.
In many Southern states, the representation in the convention was based on a Republican vote cast in some particularly fortunate Republican year, although the actual Republican vote cast has dwindled down to almost nothing. This has resulted in some Southern states with hardly any white Republicans being as well represented as some Northern states with a large Republican vote.
The numerous contests in the South, involving in some cases the rights of white and negro delegates, brought the question before the credentials committee. Negro delegates from the South called it to the resolutions committee's attention by demanding a platform plank for enforcement of the fourteenth and fifteenth amendments in the South, permitting Negroes to vote.
Southern members of the national committee are prepared to fight determinedly any effort to reduce their representation. They will face the alternative, however, Northern committeemen said today, of letting the negro Republicans vote, and thus earning the same representation as Northern states, or having their delegations reduced in proportion to the actual size of the vote cast.
Rowland's resolution directs that the new basis of representation be "just and equitable," but does not suggest or prescribe the method to be used in determining this.
