The Placer herald., 1856-02-09
Biennial Sessions.

garding it as the great cure-all for public
extravaganza. In one of the old "thirteen,"
devoted for the most part to agricultural
pursuits, where there the laws have been
modified by successive legislation until every
want has been attended to, and the Courts
have given fixed construction to those stat
utes, the rule no doubt works quite well. In
those States it would matter but little If they
did not meet more than once in five years.
for there their sessions do not last but few
weeks, and their time is taken up in chang
ing peoples names and discussing Maine
liquor laws, etc, etc. In the State of Ohio
they have tried biennial sessions, and the
people Gudging from the tone of the Press)
are quite sick Of the experiment. However
that may be, none of these States are any
guide for California in this matter. We are an
enigma, to ourselves-a novelty to the world,
and analogous to no other State in our ne
cessites. We have sprung suddenly from
chaos into sovereignty-our statute book
crude from haste and bungling legislation
the circumstances daily demonstrating mod
ifcations and additions thereto as the actual
state of affairs become better understood.
If a law is wrong, two years is long time
to suffer under it. What injustice might not
be done in that time, where fortunes are as
varied as among us? If a law is needed, two
wears is an age for a Californian to wait.
Legislation has never yet kept pace with the
people; where would it be and give them two
years the start? Depend upon it, this is po-
litical blunderbuss-a weapon well suited to
demagogues. But the people are tired of that
sort of thing. They are willing to pay for
leg;slation but their stomachs are nauseated
with quack medicines.
Doubtless, many are scrupulously honest
in the support of this alteration i'll our or
canic law: we have no wish to offend them.
In our view they are mistaken. We do not
wish to be understood as taking ground
against substantial reform-a real econo-
missing of the public money: far from it. If
competent, honest, industrious men were
elected as our lawmakers, by harmony of
action and proper attention to their legiti-
mate duties, probably six weeks would be
ample time to dc all the work each year, that
our necessities require This would be a re-
form in earnest, and the members of that
Legislature who shall effect it will be receiv-
ed by their constituency with the grateful
welcome swell done, thou good and faithful
servants
Is there Bourbon among us9 or in other
words, have we a county officer elected
according to law2
Since the decision Of the Supreme Court,
in the case of The People er rel Vesey VS.
| Church, made at its current term, involving
the legality of the election of the county
clerk of a county, the act for the erecting of
which is somewhat analogous to that under
which the counties of Klamath, Trinity, Ne
vada and Placer were organized, an interest
ing query has sprang up, as to whether our
own county officers are legally elected.
1t seems the county of Alameda was Or
ganzed in 1853, by virtue Of an Act Of the
Legislature of the 9th of April of that year.
The act provided for the election of county
officers in the same month, at which election
| Church was elected county clerk and entered
May following. In August of "a the Court
of Sessions ordered an election to be held at
the general election for all county officers
except that Of county judge. At this cleo
ton Church was again returned as clerk of
the county and received the certificate of his
election from the county Judge. In August
of SO the Board of Supervisors of that
county ordered an election to be held for
county officers at the general election at
which Nesey was elected county clerk, quail
flied as such officer, and on the first Monday
of October following demanded Of Church
the office, which was refused, upon the
ground that Church was elected in 1854, to
serve for two years. These are the facts of
that case as we CLEAN them from newspaper
report.
The Court says, "the single question for
consideration is as to the validity of the cleo
ton Of 1854. BY the terms of the act or
ganizng the county Of Alameda, the officers
elected at the first election were to hold for
two years, and until their successors were
elected and qualified. No time was provided
in the act when the second election was to
take place; it was, therefore, evidently the
intention of the Legislature, that future cleo
tons should be governed by the general act
concerning officers, which act provides that
county clerks shall be elected at the general
election in the year 1851, and every two
years thereafter, and shall enter upon the
duties of their offices on the lst Monday of