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California’s fall 1863 elections marked the first time the state attempted any sort of untraditional voting. Republicans asserted that Civil War circumstances necessitated extending suffrage to soldiers stationed away from home, but Democrats posited that absentee voting violated the state constitution and opened the door for fraud. This paper examines how California’s Republican and Democratic newspapers debated the issue from the state’s first official proposal for a solider suffrage law in January 1863 until December 1864, just after the presidential election. This research aims to answer the following questions: What arguments did the California partisan press use for and against soldier voting? And what do those arguments reveal about party newspapers in the state during the Civil War? The study not only provides insights into the nature of California’s Civil War press but also provides historical context for more recent elections in which absentee balloting was controversial.

Debate over Civil War Soldier Voting in California’s Partisan Press, 1863–1864