From his essay, ‘What the American vote for’:
“MY FIRST and only presidential vote was cast many,
many years ago. It was dictated by pure instinct. I remember
the circumstances well. Like all well-brought-up youngsters,
I had been told that it was the duty of every citizen to vote—
reasons not stated. I was prepared to obey in all good faith,
and accordingly, when the time came, I set forth to the polls.
But what was I to vote for? An issue? There was none.
You could not get a sheet of cigarette-paper between the official
positions of the two parties. A candidate? Well, who
were they? Both of them seemed to me to be mediocre timeserving
fellows who would sell out their immortal souls, if
they had any, for a turn at place and power, and throw in
their risen Lord for good measure. Suddenly, the ridiculous
truth of the matter struck me: that the whole campaign was
based on no political reason at: all, but on an astronomical
reason. We were voting simply because, since the time we
last voted, the earth had gone 1461 times around the sun, or
some such number, and for no other reason in the world. As
I approached the polls my resentment of this nonsense grew
stronger and stronger, and when I arrived I deliberately
wrote in a vote for Jefferson Davis of Mississippi.
It was not an ignorant vote, for I was fully aware that Jeff
was dead. Nor was it a piece of mere flippancy—far from it.
I found out afterward that either Mark Twain or Artemus
Ward, I forget which, had once done something of the kind,
on the plea that “if we can’t have a live statesman, let us by
all means have a first-class corpse.” There is a great deal to
be said for that idea, and I am proud to subscribe to it, but
it was not my idea at the time. My vote was a vote of serious
protest against what I regarded as an impudent and degrading
absurdity, and at this late day I am more than ever prepared
to maintain that the instinct which prompted it was sound
and enlightened. I am also prepared to show cause for believing
that this instinct actually controls the majority of our
electorate, whether they are aware of it or not, and to show
cause for believing that they are fully justified in letting it
control them.”
