How we came to suffer our franchises
Let鈥檚 get back on the stump this week and look at a few more words associated with political campaigning.
A snollygoster sounds like a monster from a folk tale but is actually an unprincipled politician who 鈥渨ill go to any lengths to win public office.鈥� It was originally 19th-century slang from the southern United States, but it was brought to national attention by former President Harry Truman when he called hypocritical politicians 鈥渟nollygosters鈥� in the 1950s.聽
One might argue that snollygosters are possessed by empleomania, 鈥渕ania for holding public office.鈥� This is a Spanish word that made its appearance in English in the mid-19th century, derived from empleo-, 鈥渆mployment,鈥� and mania, an 鈥渆xcessive desire鈥� or 鈥渙bsessive need.鈥� Many politicians seem to suffer from this. 聽
To achieve their dreams, these empleomaniacs need votes, and nowadays they calculate their campaigning based partly on the science of psephology. This word was coined in the 1950s to give a name to 鈥渢he statistical analysis of trends in voting,鈥� but what psephologists really seem to enjoy is forecasting the results of upcoming elections. Psephology is a combination of psepho- (Greek for 鈥減ebble鈥�) and -ology (鈥渢he science of鈥�).聽 This makes sense when you realize that in some ancient Athenian elections votes were cast by putting small stones in a ballot box. Psephology has had a rough couple of years, having failed to predict both 鈥淏rexit鈥� and the election of President Trump.聽
In English, the right to vote itself is sometimes referred to as suffrage. There is a folk etymology on the internet that holds suffrage to be derived from to suffer, in the older sense of 鈥渁llow鈥� or 鈥減ermit,鈥� as when Jesus says 鈥淪uffer little children to come unto me,鈥� in the King James Bible. Various groups 鈥� non-property-owning white men, African-Americans 鈥� were eventually 鈥渟uffered鈥� to vote, the story goes, and so achieved 鈥渟uffrage.鈥� Actually, voting has nothing to do with suffering, at least linguistically. (Politically, it may be a different story.) It comes from the Latin word suffragium, which simply means 鈥渁 vote.鈥�
Franchise is another word for this crucial civic duty. It comes to English from the Old French word for 鈥渇reedom,鈥� and in the 14th century it was a legal term indicating that a person or municipality was free from certain governmental rules. From there it came to mean the granting of 鈥渁 special privilege or exclusive right,鈥� which, by the 18th century, included the right to vote in elections.聽
Now I鈥檝e finally slaked my psephologomania, my 鈥渙bsessive interest in political words.鈥� That鈥檚 not a word, in the world鈥檚 opinion, but it should be.聽
