The corrupt use of money in elections has come to be one of the greatest political evils of our time. The buying of votes is a very common practice in some communities, and unfortunately is not as strongly condemned by public opinion as it should be. Some 50 per cent of the voters in one county of Ohio were disfranchised by the court for selling their votes in the general election of 1910. The growth of great corporations, many of which desire legislation in their interest, or immunity from unfavorable laws, has introduced a more or less corrupting element in our political life. Some states have enacted laws forbidding corporations, under heavy penalties, from making contributions to the campaign funds of political parties. Others have forbidden the practice of political committees of assessing office holders for campaign purposes. Some have gone to the length of forbidding "treating" and other similar means of influencing voters. Some limit the amount of money that may be spent by a candidate or his friends in the conduct of his campaign, usually specifying the purposes for which expenditures may be made. Thus the Connecticut and New York laws allow expenditures only for such matters as the rent of halls, compensation of speakers and musicians, fireworks, printing, lithographs, advertisements, traveling expenses, postage, telegrams, hiring of carriages to take voters to the polls, and the like. A few, however, prohibit the hiring of carriages, and some forbid the giving away of liquor at elections. Some states require candidates to make sworn itemized statements of the expenditures incurred by them on account of the election, and some fix the maximum amount that may be expended. Thus in New York a candidate for governor may expend only $10,000 on account of his candidacy; candidates for other state officers are permitted to spend $6,000. The need of limitations was illustrated by the fact that the Democratic candidate for governor of New York in 1906 spent over $256,000 in the prosecution of his candidacy, and a candidate for state senator spent $30,000 to secure an election.[22] A recent candidate for the United States senate in a Western state admitted that his aggregate expenses were $107,000, and another testified that he spent $115,000 in the effort to secure an election. [22] Fuller, "Government by the People," p. 150.