Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-03-20

| In Sacramento, where General Wllllams, VINO
has made his millions in Nevada, has been
retaining don't know how many acres, but,
at any rate, an island. 1t Is shown in the
improvement of every city, town and ham,
let, and / claim that where few injudicious,
foolish, adventuresome people have lost
money, thousands have not lost, but gained
livelihood, and hundreds have gained affiu-
ence. / ask, what do we propose to do? We
propose to set ourselves up to protect the peo-
pie of the State of California against their
own acts and inclinations We propose by
this legislation to protect the unwary and i'm
prudent, and the reckless gambler from ruin
ing himself aud his property. There is, as
the legal gentlemen in the Senate are aware,
law now in existence by which, whenever a
man becomes incapable of managing his own
affairs, his well-meaning relatives may be
a little ironical now-and disinterested
friends apply to the Probate Court TO
obtain a guardianship of his person
and estate, and especially his estate.
/ Under the common law it was
/ held that the man who was non compos
mentis should be protected, and the direction
/ of his affairs be given to some one else. They
/ went so far that they thought that women
did not know enough, and they had TO pro
tect them; but we have given up that
position, and there are plenty of them that
are lust as wise as men. And that law is in
/ existence Dow-whenever man proves in
capable you appoint guardian OF his person
| and estate Aud we are asked now to con-
1 slider this question, Tor upon Us deyolves the
duty of either doing what is right or what is
wrong upon this question. We are asked
now to constitute ourselves the guardians of
the persons and the estatesof a community like
! that of CALIFORNIA; community containing
men as WISE as able, as skillful, as shrewd, and
I 6 Gl,N +hara
any community in the world. And we are
asked to declare them non cempos mentis,
that is, incapable of attending to their own
| affairs. and to constitute this honorable body
the guardians of this community. Why,
a century hence, when the historian, the
statesman, the student, the scholar will
read the history of our era, he will smile
when he looks at such legislation this as
we to-day smile at the enactment of the Con-
necticut blue laws, or the attempt to legis-
late in centuries gone by religious faith into
our fore fathers, and the attempt was not one
whit more ridiculous. / say where we do it
we show our want of wisdom. We show our
want Of experience as much as they did cen
turtles ago. 1t may be said that have risen
for the purpose of scolding; it may well
be asked, especially by my friend Senator
Chase, why did | get up to talk upon this
question? 1t may be asked is there mode
OF preventing this; is there mode of wise
legislation to do what ought to be done for
the people, since, as l hope and believe a ma
jority of this Senate are opposed to the stu
pid measures embodied in this bill? Well, |
say there is, and if we look at the magnitude
of the interests involved, there should be.
There is, as | have stated, almost to my GER
tain knowledge. capital in cash of no less
than $40, 600, 600 invested in stocks Pass this
bill as the Assembly has sent it to uS-it
is true the evil may be averted,
although / am not prepared to admit it,
except for arguments sake--and stocks will
fall to nothing They will be taken up, COM
prising the substance of our fellow citizens,
and sent elsewhere where Legislatures are
more wise and more statesmanlike. 1t
may be said that for the purpose of
but what would sink into insignificance by
the comparison. That would be such stulti-
fcation that do not think it needs any argu-
ment, for | say that the business and sale of
mining stocks are so interviewer with all the
industries with the welfare of the laborer, the
mechanic, the teamster, the farmer, the mer-
chant, ard every class of interests in the State,
that the argument would not hold good. Only
the other day when your committee was sent
into the mines for the purpose of inspecting
them, it was obvious to anybody who cared to
STE bHdG tLc utility NbldSSsy Will 1iiCl
ol-houses, their banks, their hotels, their
livery stables, the farmers with their fields
and orchards, and in fact everybody depended
upon what? Upon the stalwart labor of the
miner and what he wrested from the
earth, and which would not have been
of any use to anybody unless he
applied his intelligence and his labor toit.
It is very well for the man who lives near
the center of trade and business, where he
can forward whatever he raises that he does
not need to good market. to object to min
ing al a distance. | am not prepared to think
that there are no other people in this State
besides myself; that it is not my duty to
advocate, protect and foster other interests
except those that fall directly within the
roads on which / travel. l say, as has been
remarked by my colleague, Senator Dickin-
son, this afternoon, that
1T Is NOT GAMBLING
To deal in stocks. 1t is business that has
stood the test of hundreds of years /; bust
ness which in London has assumed such
magnitude that the clearing house closing for
the week ending February 4th, of this year,
showed over 1874, 000,0 G0 to have changed
hands in securities-not alone in England,
in tin mines, in coal mines, not alone
in railroads and State securities =
but our mines in California, and the
IllueS Ill NcNdud, NuiCl L COIoiuOi q Soih-
ponent part of our State, are represented
there But here you want it destroyed
you want it wiped out because men have
lost money. 1 believe that the Senator from
the Ninth MIR. Conger), gentleman who has
had vast experience of eight years dealing
in mining stocks, was in favor of this bill,
but like Saul, before he became st. Paul, he
was struck with blindness, and then came to
to light and found this section possibly does
need an amendment.
Mr.. Conger-I would like to ask the gen.
tleman if he heard my arguments Oh the bill
the other night and on the substitute l pro-
posed this afternoon?
ARGUMENTS OR STATEMENTS.
Mr.. Neumann-I had the pleasure, and
particularly the sorrow, of listening to them
both, for arguments they can hardly be call
ed. I would rather qualify them as the
statements of the gentleman. He infused
a great deal of power, great deal of rhetoric,
and great deal of eloquence in his re-
marks and succeeded in convincing me that he
would like to be right upon this ques-
ton, but dare not, and he is now gently
edging in with his first little amend
ment. But the gentleman adduces, among
other things as the main reason why
this business should be stopped, that he
followed it eight years, knowing all its
ms and outs, representing hundreds of specn-
lators, and every one of his customers lost
money While do concede that this is the
strongest argument that has been made in
favor of this bill, perhaps these customers
might have done better if they had employed
some one else. But there is no reasoning in
that. Other reasons have been advanced,
none of them to the point. They say that
for the purpose of reforming people, for the
purpose of having them avoid the snares of
wagering and gambling, we should restrict or
prohibit the business, and that will be uni
versal panacea for all the evils that we have
had depicted. l have heard the simile used
FIVE times abouts the streets of San Francisco
being strewn with wrecks-hnancial wrecks;
about Pauper alley teening with men re-
duced to poverty, who do nothing and never
Stock Board and see how prices ranged. One
gentleman pathetically said that the Bay of
San Francisco was "stiff with the corpses
that foated there of suicides, ruined by that
Ill l1,,A ,Io,x,