by Ed Naile

Update: The Dartmouth on Recent Attempts to Tighten Up Voting Requirements

There are some bills coming up in the New Hampshire House of Representatives this week, Thursday to be more precise.

HB 176 and 223 are intended to limit non-resident voting in our state. This has become an epidemic in my opinion.

There was an article in The Dartmouth forwarded to me last week which says there will be some Dartmouth students attending hearings to defend their abuse of our electoral process.

Here it is: Students Defend Right to Vote

“State Sen. Matthew Houde ’91, D-Plainfield, discussed the constitutionality of House Bill 176 in Collis Common Ground on Thursday.”

“The bill, proposed by State Rep. Gregory Sorg, R-Grafton, changes the definition of domicile, requiring that an individual’s residence for voting eligibility “be the most recent place where he or she as an adult or where his or her parents or legal guardians with whom he or she resided as a minor established physical presence,” according to the bill.

The College Democrats recently created and circulated a petition against the bill throughout various New Hampshire college campuses on Feb. 14. The petition had approximately 500 signatories as of Friday.

Dartmouth political groups have also arranged for students to both attend and testify at the Feb. 24 hearing, according to Helding.”

So the Dartmouth students like politics?

Try this on for size.

I pasted below, some interesting paragraphs from the Dartmouth Charter which was amended in 2003 to pack the Board of Trustees with so many people that a group of Libertarian grads, then running for the Board, could not take control.

At one time the Dartmouth College Board of trustees included; the NH Governor, Executive Council, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, and the Speaker of the NH House.

They have all been quietly removed except for the NH Governor.

I think it might be time to exercise good old RSA 292, regarding non-profits, and have a bit more control of their exclusive little kingdom.

In fact, we could add a couple NH citizens to the Board of Trustees to balance out the huge new board. Too many self-important eggheads spoil the pot, they say.

Check this out:

Last paragraph of Article 13 of the Dartmouth Charter

By an act passed at the 2003 session of the New Hampshire Legislature (Laws of 2003, Chapter 161), the College was authorized to make amendments to the charter without approval by the legislature, in the manner provided under the New Hampshire voluntary corporation law, RSA 292:7, provided that the governor shall continue to serve as an ex-officio member of the Board of Trustees.

Second to last paragraph of Article 16

By vote taken November 15, 2003, the Trustees, exercising the authority conferred by the New Hampshire Legislature in Chapter 161 of the Laws of 2003, voted to amend the charter to increase the number of Trustees to not more than twenty, in addition to the President and the Governor ex-officio.

By vote taken September 8, 2007, the charter was amended to increase the number of Trustees to twenty-six, provided that the number of Trustees to be elected by the Board upon nomination by the Board shall be sixteen, that the number of Trustees to be elected upon nomination by the alumni shall be eight, and that the Governor ex-officio and the President during his or her term of service shall continue to be Trustees.

292:7 Change of Name; Amending Articles. – Any corporation (Dartmouth) now or hereafter organized or registered in accordance with the provisions of this chapter, and any existing corporation which may have been so organized or registered, may change its name, increase or decrease its capital stock or membership certificates, merge with or acquire any other corporation formed pursuant to this chapter, or amend its articles of agreement, by a majority vote of such corporation’s board of directors or trustees, at a meeting duly called for that purpose, and by recording a certified copy of such vote in the office of the secretary of state and in the office of the clerk of the town or city in this state which is its principal place of business. In the case of a foreign nonprofit corporation registered in New Hampshire, a copy of the amendment or plan of merger, certified by the proper officer of the state of incorporation, shall be filed with the secretary of state, together with the fee provided in RSA 292:5. The surviving corporation in a merger shall continue to have all the authority and powers vested in the merging corporations, including any powers previously conferred upon them by the legislature.

That Dartmouth crowd is so smart they protected themselves from any possibility some Libertarian Dartmouth grads might gain influence on their clubby board of directors by making the bard too large for that to happen.

Remember, back in 2003 is when this took place.

At that time I was up in Hanover with several Free State members and 250 “ballots” we made from genuine NH Chinese restaurant receipts. Our votes for the Dartmouth Board of Trustees were written on each one – by hand.

We went to the most official looking building we saw open and asked to vote.

They looked annoyed!

I stood on the sidewalk for a while with one of those Palestinian head scarves draped on my head and shoulders – looking very stylish.

Along with my head gear I had a sign that said: “Let My People Vote.” There was much waving, smiling, and support from the students driving and walking by.

We made the cover of The Dartmouth Review.

I got hate e-mail from some Harvard.edu address.

All in all, it was fun, about as much fun as it is going to be this week watching non-residents demand a Republican Legislature sit back and let them keep stealing NH citizens votes.