The practice of introducing as voters, under various pretexts, persons not entitled to vote. See quotation 1850.
1840. The profuse use of gold, corruption of the franchise by pipe layers and yarn spinners,… have conspired to elect W. H. Harrison.—Richmond Enquirer, Nov.
1841. I was not defeated by voters. I was defeated by “pipe layers.”—Mr. Duncan of Ohio, House of Repr., Jan. 25: Cong. Globe, p. 155, App.
1841. Others say that fraud, double voting, pipe laying, transfer of voters from one point to another, Hessians conducted by police officers and agents from city to city,—that these have done much to carry the election.—Mr. Benton of Missouri, U.S. Senate, Jan. 26: id., p. 120, App.
1841. Mr. Cooper of Pennsylvania alluded to the language used by Mr. Brown in reference to Mr. Bela Badger and other pipe-layers of Philadelphia, who, he prophesied, would soon be again in their proper sphere, the Penitentiary.—House of Repr., July 2: id., p. 143.
1841. The City of New York was defrauded, by pipe-laying, out of her representatives.—Mr. Wood of N.Y., the same, Aug, 3: id., p. 279, App.
1841. Their silly banners and rolling balls, their low doggerel log cabin songs, and their pipe-laying, were all alike disgusting.—Mr. Dean of Ohio, the same, Aug. 5: id., p. 259, App.
1841. Your schemes had been brought to light, your frauds exposed; your pipe laying laid bare; and last, though not least, your electioneering funds had run low.—Mr. Eastman of N. Hampshire, the same, Dec. 29: id., p. 51, App.
1842. Pipe-laying was said by Mr. Wright of N.Y. to have originated in the city and county of Philadelphia: U.S. Senate, May 31: id., p. 471, App.
1842. Mr. Linn of Missouri was of the opinion that compelling the elections to be held on the same day throughout the republic would prostrate the pipe-laying system.—The same, June 8: id., p. 496, App.
1842. We are promised in a few days an authentic account of the Pipe laying method, by which the honest voters of Walnut Ward were robbed of their rights in 1838.—Phila. Spirit of the Times, Jan. 30.
1842. Men who were in fact “pipe layers,” authors of false registers of fictitious names…. The Democratic party should discharge every pipe-layer, falsifier, and notorious traitor.—Id., May 23.
1844. I have evidence indisputable that not less than 700 voters were imported into the single county of Hamilton (Ohio), at the Election of 1840, to defeat the democratic ticket by a regular, organized system of swindling and pipe-laying.—Mr. Duncan of Ohio, House of Repr., March 6: Cong. Globe, p. 399, App.
1845. It is not in the wide-spread West where you are told of frauds, perjuries, pipe-laying, and bribery.—Mr. Brown of Indiana, the same, Jan. 14: id., p. 97, App.
1848. The result of the Pennsylvania election would not be in the least doubtful, if we could be assured of fair play and no pipe-laying.—N.Y. Tribune, Oct. 30 (Bartlett).
1850. Ordinary political swindling, such as hog-droving or pipe-laying on a small scale, at so much per head, would not meet the occasion.—Mr. Leffler, House of Repr., June 27: Cong. Globe, p. 822, App.
1850. Fifty or sixty Irish labourers … were conciliated for some years by employment in the Croton water-works, so that “pipe-laying” became the slang term for this kind of bribery.—Lyell, ‘Second Visit U.S.,’ ii. 6. (N.E.D.)
1888. There are not a few who are pipe-laying and marshalling forces for the fray.—San Francisco Examiner, March 22 (Farmer).
